The Ancient Ones
by Usagi-Zakura
Summary: New and improved! A story about the precursors, before they became precursor and origin of the dark makers
1. The Real Beginning

**Miss.Ecofreak: Welcome old and new readers of this fanfic. "The Ancient ones" was deleted due to spelling errors and such, I've tried to fix it and hopefully I've succeeded.**

**Zakura: Miss.Ecofreak is worried now (giggles) wouldn't want to loose one of very few stories that actually make sense.**

**Miss.Ecofreak: shut it. I made some changes while I was spellchecking.**

**I changed things that I didn't really like about the original version.**

**Like makingthe intro longer, explaining more about the ottsels.**

**I've also avoided using the word "Precursor" because that sounds more like a name for a godlike creature, not an ordinary ottsel.**

**Zakura: hello. They are ottsels**

**Miss.Ecofreak: I know. But for now that's all they are. Not all-mighty gods, not planet creators, not embarrassed over how they look…**

**Zakura: how do you know?**

**Miss.Ecofreak: (ignores the rabbit) anyway.**

**I do not own the precursors or the ottsels though most of the characters appearing in the start of this fic are mine.**

**I also own this killer rabbit, but she's not appearing in the main fic.**

**Zakura: bummer**

**Miss.Ecofreak: also this fic contains spoilers for Jak3. **

**I'm mostly talking about the precursor's appearance.**

**But now; enjoy the new and hopefully improved **

**THE ANCIENT ONES**

**By Miss.Ecofreak the Dark Precursor**

**Introduction**

I bet you all know the story about the two friends who saved countless worlds from the dark makers.

But how do you know how this war actually started?

To find the answer, we have to go back in time.

(Zakura shows Jak3 opening sequence)

Nope, further back.

(Zakura shows Jak in prison)

Further…

(Zakura shows Jak and Daxter in Sandover)

BACK TO THE BEGINNING STUPID RABBIT!

(Zakura shows big bang… by blowing up Miss.Ecofreak's bed)

Er… too far.

**About ottsels**

A precursor, or as some refers to them as, ottsel, isn't the first creature you would think of to be a god.

An average ottsel is two feet tall, and looks quite like a weasel or an otter, standing on its hind legs.

Their fur is usually orange or sometimes brown.

White or yellow stomach, with light markings on their feet and arms, some also had darker or lighter markings on their tail and ears.

But their greatest gift isn't related to their size and appearance, it's their intelligence.

They've created dozens of amazing worlds but their most remarkable invention must be the six kinds of eco.

It was this invention, which they first saw as a blessing that would lead to their destruction.

**CHAPTER 1**

**THE REAL BEGINNING**

In the beginning, before eco and space traveling, the ottsels were not seen as gods at all.

In fact, most predators on their own home planet saw them as nothing but…

"Save me!"

…dinner.

An orange, yellow striped ottsel jumped through the bushes.

Right behind him, was one of the ottsel's first enemies.

A lizard at the size of a very large dog was snapping for the young ottsel's tail, missing it by only a few inches.

The ottsel had only two ways of defending himself, one was his speed, and he was using it well.

The other was his intelligence, but even that seemed to fail the little guy at the moment.

When you're running for your life from a dreaded predator it's not easy to think clear, a mistake that had cost so many ottsels their lives in the past.

"Hey you! You better leave me alone, I taste really bad!"

A worthless lie, precdators can't understand ottsel-language.

The ottsel tried to turn over and run in another direction.

Big mistake, as he turned over, the precdator quickly grabbed his tail and held him.

"Help me! I don't want to die just yet!" the ottsel cried. "Please! I have a beautiful girlfriends and she's pregnant! I wanna see the kids grow up before I die! Have mercy!"

But it was no use; the precdator might even have kids of its own, hungry kids.

It dragged the ottsel by his tail back towards his nest.

That is, until something hard hit its head, hard and heavy.

The startled lizard dropped the terrified ottsel and looked around to see what had hit it when the big log which was hanging from a tree, hit it once more and knocked it out.

The ottsel let out a sigh of relief.

"What took you so long?" he asked up in the tree.

A second, smirking, ottsel popped his head out of the branches.

"What's the matter Buster? I thought you knew how to handle these stupid predators" the new ottsel said.

Buster glared at him.

"I was only five months when I said that" he said, brushing dust out of his fur. "Besides Rambo, you've been saying the exact same thing for years".

"Yup, and now I've saved your life, again" Rambo answered, jumping down from the tree to greet his brother.

"Actually, I came here for another reason than just to save your tail" he explained. "The contractions just started".

Buster stopped cleaning his fur and stared at Rambo.  
"You mean… she's having it now?" he asked.

"You better hurry if you want to meet your son or daughter" Rambo said pointing back to the precursor town.

Buster didn't waste any time, he jumped straight over his brother, completely forgetting how tired he was, and headed home.

Tunnel Town was far from full of the technical wonders that later made the ottsels famous, it was merely a small village, much like what the old Sandover was.

But of course, Sandover didn't exist at this time.

The town was built underground to protect it from predators; it was the home of the Tunnel-tribe, one of many ottsel-tribes on the planet.

Buster tripped over the tunnel-entrance but quickly got to his feet and ran towards the nearest hospital.

The "hospital" was frankly a small house, not much bigger than the other houses, with only one doctor.

But in the small Tunnel-tribe, that doctor was the best.

Buster hardly had time to open the door so he crashed into it.

The nurse came and opened the door for him.

"Well if it isn't the father-to-be" she said. "Are you here to see your mate or do you want me to fix that broken nose of yours?"

"Very funny Brownie, is Snowrose alright?" Buster asked.

"She's fine. Just go see for yourself" Nurse Brownie said and moved out of the way so Buster could get in.

He walked into one of the rooms to find his beautiful snow-white wife.

In her arms she was holding a new-born precursor-ottsel, it had orange fur like any other, just a bit darker than average.

Snowrose smiled as her husband entered.

"Congratulations darling, you have a son" she said.

Buster picked up the baby-boy to have closer look.

"Would you look at that, he looks just like his grandmother" he said. "What should we call him?"

Snowrose thought for a moment.

"What about Balder? After your father?" she suggested.

"That's a good name, welcome to the family Balder" Buster said.

**Miss.Ecofreak: and that was the beginning of the beginning. **

**Zakura: Hey wait a minute! Rambo is the name of my father!  
Miss.Ecofreak: yup. I didn't quite know what to name those ottsels so I decided to name some of them after the animals in my school.**

**So how do you like it so far?**

**Zakura: do we need more fuzzy animals?**

**Miss.Ecofreak: or does the story generally suck? (If you feel that way please remember stories rarely get good in the first chapter, and this might take some time) Please review and tell me.**


	2. Life In Tunnel Town

**Miss.Ecofreak: It's almost fun rewriting the fics, at least when I find new ideas later (and that happens a lot) I've decided I want to do that on my first fanfic too, Growing Up In Haven City, so if it suddenly disappears without a trace in the near future, I might have temporarily deleted it**

**Zakura: what's wrong with that?**

**Miss.Ecofreak: Just some bits and pieces that I'm not pleased with... But before you ask, I won't change Jak's family history since that would totally destroy the plot of the Light Within. But I am thinking of doing a (sort of) new version in the Ancient Ones 2 where his history will be differentyet Katewill still get a part in it(If I feel like writing that)**

**Does that sound like a good idea?**

**But enough talk of other fics, on with the Ancient Ones!**

**CHAPTER 2**

**LIFE IN TUNNEL TOWN**

"Hey daddy! Wanna play hide and seek with me?"

"Not now kiddo, daddy's busy".

Balder, who had now grown into quite a hyper little ottsel, put up the biggest brown puppy-eyes he could master.

"Don't give me that look son. I have important work to do" Buster said petting his son's head. "Why don't you go play with your little sister?"

"But Anny is far too easy to find! No fun at all" Balder said. "Why is her fur so much different from everyone else's?"

There came the big question, most ottsels in the colony were born orange or brown, or, as in Balder's case, a combination of both colors.

It wasn't always easy telling weather Balder's fur was brown or orange, he had both colors covering his entire body, and except his tummy which was white.

The tip of his feet was white as well, while his fingers and the tip of his ears and tail were all brown.

His sister Anny on the other hand, seemed to have inherited some of her mother's most dangerous genes.

Snowrose, like her name says, was all white and with shining red eyes, an albino, one of natures mistakes.

Of course Buster found her fur pretty, but it was hopeless when it came to hiding, Snowrose had therefore never been allowed to leave the tunnels, and she had never seen the sun before.

Anny was light blue on most of her body, while the color on her stomach was white, Buster was afraid she would not be able to go outside either, it would be too easy for a precdator to find her and eat her.

"Well, Balder. That is a good question" Buster said. "Mommy and Anny are… special".

"Yeah but why? No other ottsels in the colony are white?" Balder said.

He was right; most albino-newborns were killed, since they would never be able to survive in the big world anyway.

For elves and humans, this may sound ruthless, but ottsels relied heavily on their ability to blend into the environments in order to get food.

White ottsels couldn't hide, and had to rely on others to go outside to get food for them.

An albino would only be a burden for the other ottsels, and extra trouble was the last thing they needed.

Snowrose's mother had died during child birth, and her father decided to keep the child, since she was all he had left of his departed wife.

He got food for his daughter his whole life, until she married Buster.

"Listen kiddo. I'll play with you for a few minutes if you promise to go ask your mother afterwards, okay?" Buster said.

"Okay!" said Balder, forgetting all about the question immediately.

Hide and seek was the favorite game of most ottsel-children, it was actually more than just a game; it was practice for the real thing when they had to hide from predators outside of the tunnels.

Young ottsels weren't allowed outside the tunnels, but adults sometimes went out to find food, fruits and fishes rarely lived underground.

The game didn't last for long.

Balder had long since found his favorite hiding spot and refused to hide anywhere else although everyone in the colony knew where he was.

Still, Buster liked to pretend he didn't know but today he was in a hurry and quickly found the kid.

"Perhaps it's time to find a new hiding spot?" he asked as he lifted the shrub his son was hiding under.

"Why? This is the perfect spot! I even have berries if nobody finds me" Balder said showing the berries of the "tunnel-shrub" to his father.

Buster laughed, it was no point trying to change this young ottsel's mind.

"Come on invincible berry-eater. Let's go home and see if mommy's got dinner ready" he said and picked up his son.

As they walked home the two ottsels passed one of the many tunnels that lead outside Tunnel Town.

"Dad? What is it outside Tunnel Town?" Balder asked.

He was never tired of asking that question.

"Well… it's big… and dangerous" Buster explained.

"That's what you always say" Balder said sounding disappointed. "That's what everybody always says! They always talk about precdators and birds of prey, but how come we can't just tell them to leave us alone?"

"Well… it's in their nature. Just like it's in our nature to eat fish" Buster said.

"Can't we chase them away then?" Balder asked.

"You surely are a brave one aren't you?" Buster asked. "The precdators are way to strong for an ottsel to beat, and the draco-birds only fly away. I'm sorry kid; we just have to live with them".

But deep in his mind, Buster actually agreed with his son.

In fact that was what he had been working on all these years, a way to defeat the predators outside, so that his wife and daughter could come out and see the sun.

Other ottsels said it was impossible of course, there was absolutely no way an ottsel could become the most powerful beings in the world, they said.

"There you are!"

A female voice interrupted Buster's thoughts.

Snowrose stood outside their small hut with little Anny standing by her feet.

"You shouldn't play out for too long, dinner is ready" she said.

"What is it? Not cave-plants again?" Balder asked.

"No, in fact your dear uncle was kind enough to go up to Mountain-Lake Town and get us some good deep-water fish" Snowrose said as Buster's brother Rambo appeared in the doorway.

"And you better like it, cause I had to avoid five nasty precdators on the way up there, including their kids" Rambo said. "Too bad the Mountain-Lake-fishes only appear in the underground lakes once a year to breed, of course they had to pick the time of year that the precdator-young learn to hunt. Do have any idea how traumatizing it is to be used as a toy by those monsters? Makes me wish their parents just killed me on the spot".

"Shh Rambo, not in front of the kids" Snowrose said. "Come on everyone, let's eat".

"Er… I'm sorry dear, but I have so much to do at work" Buster said.

Snowrose looked at him with disappointment in her eyes.

"Again? You never have time to your family anymore" she said.

"I know hon. and once again I'm sorry. But this important, it's about our future. Our children's future" Buster said.

"Yeah. I know" Snowrose said, still sounding a bit sad. "Keep fighting the good fight Buster. I'll leave some fish for you to eat when you come back".

"I may not be home until late, so don't stay up and wait" Buster said before he ran of towards his office.

"You never do" Snowrose said silently as her mate disappeared from view.

**Miss.Ecofreak: how's that? PLEASE REVIEW!**


	3. A Dose of Hyperactivity

**Miss.Ecofreak: chapter 3 up! (again) Almost got worried there for a second I couldn't upload it because of the red note here**

**Zakura: which one? You mean the one that says the web page will be offline? But that's not untill eight pm, now it's just 19 minutes past 10 am**

**Miss.Ecofreak: right... How'd you know that? Not only don't you have a watch but the clock is 19 minutes past 18**

**Zakura: but it's 19 past 10 in LA**

**Miss.Ecofreak: Precisely! How do you know what the clock is in LA? **

**Zakura: (whistles innocently)**

**Miss.Ecofreak: okay! Give me back my cell phone! Er... back to the story**

**CHAPTER 3**

**A DOSE OF HYPERACTIVITY**

"So, what do we got?" Buster asked as soon as he came in the door.

His colleague, Jingo, stared blankly at a bottle filled with a green liquid.

"We have some green stuff here that heals bruises instantly" Jingo said. "Unfortunately it's no use for an ottsel who has just been eaten".

Buster sighed.

"Great. Just sell it to the hospital and we'll start from scratch" he sighed.

Jingo stuffed the bottle in a cardboard box along with the notes and ingredients.

"What are we doing here anyway? For the last four years we've been searching for something that can help the ottsels climb higher in the circle of life, a miracle potion that probably doesn't even exist" Jingo said.  
"We can't give up hope! It's out there I know it" Buster said.

"How can you know? I'm getting sick of this" Jingo said. "So far we've only invented a new way to clear the garden of parasites and a green liquid that heals broken limbs.

I've got a family to tend to Buster, and so do you. Wouldn't you like to see them grow up?"  
"If they grow up" Buster said. "And even if they do grow up, what kind of life will they get? Anny will have to stay in the caves all her life while Balder has to risk his life to find food to keep both himself and her alive! And what if he gets killed? What will happen to Anny? What if nobody wants to care for her?"

"It's kind of your own fault" Jingo muttered.

"What did you say?" Buster snarled.

"You were the one who had to fall for an albino! Even though you know what dangers it can cause! Why didn't you just do as I suggested and married someone ground-colored?" Jingo said accusingly.

"Keep Snowrose out of this!" Buster said.

"Of course! She can't help that she's white. She was doomed to die, no good breeding material" Jingo said as he picked down some of the creepy stuff on his shelf.

Buster glared at Jingo. How dared he say those things about his mate? Didn't she have the right to live free from fear was that it?

All he wanted was for his wife and daughter to see the sun, was that really so bad?

Jingo didn't get it. All his children were either orange or light-brown, they could hide if they wanted to, and so could Balder. But not Anny and Snowrose. Not if Buster failed.

"There must be a way to stop those predators" he muttered. "They must have a weakness".

"Sure. If we die out they will starve to death" said Jingo. "So why don't we just all commit mass suicide?"

"This isn't a joke Jingo" Buster said.

"No, of course it isn't. We're only looking for something that can wipe out the entire precdator and draco-bird population. Then what? It'll all be fun and games?" Jingo asked. "It has happened before Buster. Remember your history-lessons.

Many millions of years ago there were no such things as precdators, or draco-birds. The ottsels and the now extinct chinbits at that time had other predators to hide from. But then a large meteor struck.

The ottsels survived because they hid underground, and since they already knew of the coming danger, they advised the tree-climbing chinbits to do the same.

For many years the chinbits and the ottsels shared the caves underground, as great masses of sand from the meteor strike blocked the sun away, making life above ground level to cold and inhospitable even for the thick coated chinbits. No food was found except the plants growing underground, getting heat from the very core of the planet.

But then the sun came back, and scouts reported all the previous predators were gone. All that had survived were some tiny lizards and insects.

The chinbits were thrilled to get back outside, but in a matter of 3 million years they were all gone. Do you remember why Buster?"  
"The lizards evolved" Buster muttered. "With no other competition they grew into becoming the precdators, and hunted the chinbits to extinction".

"Precisely. So even if you kill the modern-day predators, soon there will be more of them, even more deadly. When the highest rank species dies out, another will take its place. That's the circle of life" Jingo said.

"Not if we take that place" Buster said.

"Not this again" Jingo said, too bored of the conversation, he didn't watch what he was doing as he pored the wrong ingredient into his potion.

"Watch out!" Buster yelled as he noticed but it was already too late. The potion exploded, right into Jingo's face.

Buster shook the dust of his fur, looking at what was once Jingo's part of the office.

"Jingo!" Buster shouted.  
"I'm right here" a voice said.

Buster turned around, only to see a very shaky brown ottsel, Jingo, standing right behind him.  
"Jingo? How on earth did you manage to get out?" Buster asked.

"I-I don't know" Jingo admitted. "But I think it was that thing I just created".

He pointed at the blue sparkling liquid that had pored out on the floor.

Buster noticed the same blue sparks were flowing across Jingo's body.

"Great mother of the rocks. I think we just had a breakthrough" Buster said. "Come on; help me scrape up some of this "blue eco"."

**Miss.Ecofreak: whoho! I got the chinbits in too! In case you don't know what a chinbit is, they are crosses of chinchillas and rabbits that I made up for another fic. I just realized I wanted to write some more about where they came from too.**

**The chinbit's body is like a chinchilla's.**

**They are very round fuzzy animals with the back feet of a rabbit and the front paws with chinchilla fingers. The tail is of a chinchilla, long and fuzzy and their ears long like rabbit ears.**

**I've got a coverat for this fic up at DA right now, just follow the link in my profile. There is a picture of a chinbit and some of the ottsel characters+Rose, XD and Kor. Go on watch it**

**Zakura: you killed them!**

**Miss.Ecofreak: er… yeah… more species on the precursor-planet will probably die out during the fic, but not the ottsels of course; they will live on for all eternity!**

**Zakura: I hate you.**

**Miss.Ecofreak: watch it or I'll put in rabbits and drive them to extinction too. Please review.**


	4. Troubling Discovery

**CHAPTER 4**

**TROUBLING DISCOVERY**

The discovery of the new substance, called blue eco, was very popular amongst the inhabitants of Tunnel Town.

Not only did it help giving the ottsels more energy, it also turned out to be great fuel for their machines.

Still Buster felt he could get more out of his research so it didn't take long before he was back in his lab with Jingo.

Even Jingo had a bit higher confidence now.

"So what kind of miracle mixture shall we make up this time doc?" he asked Buster one day, as he arrived to his lab.

"Couldn't we try to figure out anything that could make an ottsel stronger? Since we've already managed to get faster" Buster said.

"It should be possible" Jingo said. "In fact, I already thought of a theory that could work. I've managed to collect some blood samples from dead draco-birds, so I might be able to figure out the secret behind their firepower".

"Try it" Buster said.

It didn't take long before two new kinds of eco were finished.

The yellow eco, contained firepower even more powerful than the strongest draco-bird, and the red eco was more like the eco that Buster wanted to make in the first place, something that could make the ottsels stronger.

Some might say that was enough, the people of Tunnel Town had already decided Buster and Jingo deserved a great deal of prices for each type of eco they had created, the green eco (which was the first), the blue eco, the yellow eco and Buster's pride, the red eco.

Even so, Buster wanted more.

"We've made it this far" he said to his wife as he was leaving for work. "If we made the red eco stronger… or maybe combining red and yellow… just think what we could do!"  
"You already made a mixture that can knock out most of the precdators around Tunnel Town" Snowrose sighed. "Why do we need more than that?"

"The precdators aren't going to just stand by and let us kick their tails for long, evolution will make them stronger. We have to stay one step ahead" Buster said.

"It's nature. We'll evolve too" Snowrose said.

"Are you sure about that? How do you know nature just decided we should stay prey for all eternity? Are we just going to accept that? Let our race fall like the chinbits did?" Buster asked. "We have to beat them now while we still can. And let "nature" figure out how the world should be without the precdators and with us, the ottsels on top of the food chain".

And before Snowrose was able to complain, Buster had left again.

"Dad's really cool isn't he?" said Balder, who had been standing by his parents listening (obviously he had only heard what his father had said).

"He sure is" Snowrose answered, though she didn't exactly agree.

Buster's lab had grown since the discovery of the first green eco.

With all the money and fame he got from his researches, more and more ottsels wanted to join his project.

Jingo was still there of course, even his oldest son, Spike, had joined the project, though only as an assistant for the scientists, fetching coffee and stuff.

"There he is! The big boss" he said enthusiastically as Buster entered. "Do you want me to get some coffee for you boss? Or perhaps you want some water. I can go to the grocery store and get you some muffins if you like me to boss"

"Er. No thanks Spike. But I think Kiro might need some help over there" Buster said.

Spike quickly turned around and ran towards Kiro's work place as Buster walked over to Jingo, who was laughing his head of.

"Did he get too much blue eco this morning?" Buster asked.

"No. He just thinks you're the best" Jingo said between his giggles. "Did you notice he just said boss like every other second or so?"  
"Yes I did. Why on earth did you bring him here?" Buster asked.

"He needed some experience. Maybe he'll make a good scientist some day, in a couple of millenniums" said Jingo as Spike tripped in the vacuum cleaner he had forgotten to put away and spilled all of Kiro's coffee all over the floor that he had just washed with mentioned vacuum cleaner.** (Okay so I managed to sneak in a clown here too)**

Buster just sighed as Jingo started laughing again.

"Okay enough fooling around! Are we making progress?" Buster said.

"A little bit. We tried mixing the yellow and red eco as you said and even put in some blue eco to make it more versatile but eh…"

"What?" Buster asked.

"It blew up" Jingo said, pointing at some burn marks on the wall. "Some of us got a few scrapes but nothing green eco couldn't fix".

"Oh, well… good work anyway" Buster said and went of to his own desk.

For a couple of hours it was actually quiet at the work place, except the occasional sounds of Spike tripping in random things.

But suddenly…

"Buster! I think I got something here!"

Buster and most of the team ran over to the desk of Blooney, a grey-colored female ottsel who was now staring at a bottle of sparkling purple liquid. **(Oh uh)**

"What is that?" Tia, Kiro's sister asked.

"It looks dangerous. Let's flush it" said her friend Tara.

But Buster walked over to the liquid and picked it up.

"Doesn't look that bad to me" he said. "In fact; I think we've reached our ultimate goal."

**Miss.Ecofreak: and cut! Anyone want to guess what that purple thingy is?**

**Zakura: as if it was any doubt.**

**Miss.Ecofreak: shh! Let the readers guess. Please review and… yeah… review**

**Zakura: and give me some salad! And a large roosted pig.**

**Miss.Ecofreak: that rabbit scares me sometimes.**


	5. Disadvantages of the Purple Eco

**CHAPTER 5**

**DISADVANTAGES OF THE PURPLE ECO**

The purple eco made it a big hit.

Even after the first test, the test subjects came home with a dead precdator, one which Buster always bragged about.

"In the past this used to be us" he said pointing at the precdator that had been placed in his laboratory. "But now finally we can get our revenge, the precdator-race is doomed!"

"Are you sure this is a good idea? You can't possibly mean you want to kill all of them?" Snowrose asked.

She and Rambo had come to visit him at work.

"Why not? If we do that we can walk around up there without fear. No more precdators, no more draco-birds. We would rule the planet!" Buster said.  
"Sorry brother. This plan is insane" Rambo said. "You're messing with forces you don't understand."

"And what is that supposed to mean?" Buster asked. "We kill the precdators, we live happily ever after. What is it that I don't understand?"

Rambo just sighed.

"Whatever. Just don't come crying to me when your world falls apart" he said and left. **(Zakura: err… rather stupid to just walk out like that without trying to stop his brother from destroying the world? Miss.Ecofreak: nah…Buster won't listen anyway, he knows that)**

Just a few weeks later, a cash price was put up to the ottsel who killed the most precdators.

"The monsters have to go" were Buster's words; Balder thought the whole thing was great.

Since Buster was now a hero, that meant he was popular amongst the other ottsel-kids.

"My daddy smashed four precdators this week" he said to his friends. "He's just the strongest ottsel ever".

"Not to mention the smartest" Anny said. "He even let us come out and see once. It was the very first time we've been allowed to go outside".  
"You've been allowed to go outside the tunnels?" one of the ottsel children asked. "My mom won't let me go until I'm at least 3 years old!" **(Miss.Ecofreak: this is a bit inspired by weasel-life span, they don't live very long so the young grow up quickly. These are probably only a few months old and will reach maturity around 6 months-1 year. Zakura: as if you know anything about weasels. That's rabbits you're talking about. Miss.Ecofreak: whatever. My small animal -knowledge covers mostly pets. 3 years would still be a long time to stay with its mom although ottsels are almost immortal)**

A few of the adult ottsels weren't all that positive to this new eco.

They said it gave them a creepy feeling, as if the substance was more evil than even the precdators.

But yet, the majority just laughed of their worries; those were mainly those who had tried to channel the purple eco.

"It will help us win the war" they said. "What's so bad about that?"  
Weeks passed by, and soon no precdators were sighted near Tunnel Town in days.

A large party was to be held right outside the tunnel, even the children participated, some leaving the caves for the first time in their life.

But there were two who didn't join the party.

"Well it seems like Buster saved the world" Rambo said as he looked at the party from a three. "But what's going to happen next?"

"Something terrible I tell you" his friend, Otto, said. "I have a very bad feeling about this, and my dreams are getting worse".

Otto had the gift of foresight, like a few ottsels had.

Yet he was not good at interpreting his mysterious dreams, but he could feel if something bad was about to happen.

"What are they about?" Rambo asked.

Otto closed his eyes, hoping to see the dreams for his inner eye, in order to explain them better.

"Darkness" he said eventually. "And that purple stuff was flowing freely in Tunnel Town, transforming everyone who touched it into monsters.

Purple eco sounds to kind for it, a more appropriate name would be _Dark Eco_"

Dark Eco.

Not even Otto knew what kind of suffering it would create in the future, how this liquid would cause doomsday for many worlds.

Balder had sneaked of during the party.

He was in that age where he felt like exploring on his own, and with no precdators around he was free to do it.

He wanted to go find some berries, his favorite-food.

But he found none, all the bushes were emptied.

"What happened here?" he wondered out loud.

A small tweet was heard behind him, and he could see who the culprits were.

Berry-eating birds. And they weren't few.

At leas ten of each species (sometimes a lot more) was sitting in the same three.

Some were grooming their feathers; others were just staring at him.

Balder gasped, he had never seen so many birds in his life; no ottsel had.

He just stood by staring at the group in the three until more of the birds noticed him.

These birds were hardly bigger than an ottsel's foot, but still they felt annoyed by his presence.

With a loud battle shriek from one of the smallest birds, all of them flew towards the young ottsel.

Balder couldn't do anything to chase them away; he was hungry and had never touched eco.

"Help! Help someone!" Balder yelled as he tripped over a branch, but he knew no one would be able to hear him over the sound of the birds anyway.

But then suddenly one bird burst into flames, the next got a regular wooden stick through his stomach **(Zakura: what a horrible way to die! Miss.Ecofreak: there are worse. Trust me. Go see a Chinese fur-farm.)**

The birds took of, and Balder could finally see who his saviors were.

"_The birds are no danger _they said, _probably just a stranger coming into another bird's territory_. Yeah right!"  
"Uncle Rambo?" Balder said in surprise.

And sure enough there was Rambo, channeling yellow eco, and Otto channeling red.

"We heard the bird cry and thought you might need some help" Otto said.

"Thanks, but how did you know…?" Balder asked but Rambo interrupted.

"There have never been so many berry-birds in this mountain in an ottsel-age **(which is one heck of a long time.)** What do you thing the population's growth comes from?" Rambo asked.

"I… I have no idea" Balder asked, still shaken after the bird-attack.

"Precdators. They're not catching ottsels anymore so they can't catch anything else either" Rambo said. "The birds are used to having their young eaten so they lay a lot of eggs.

But when no precdator eats them what happens? They need more food so they rib every bush in the forest and so there are nothing left for the rest of us and they get angry when we get into their turf."

It didn't take Balder long to think of what had happened.

"This is because of the purple eco" he said. "The mountain is free from predators now so there's no one to keep the bird population down".

"Wow. He's smart for his age" Otto said.  
"Of course. He takes after his uncle" Rambo said. "But at least he's able to accept the truth, unlike his father".

"I have to go warn dad" Balder said, and before Rambo had time to open his mouth, he had ran of.

Buster was at the party, doing a little speech he had prepared when his son came barging in.

"Dad! Something's happened" he said.

"What is it son? Why are you bleeding?" Buster asked. "Did you fall over or something?"  
"No, it's not that it's…" Balder didn't finish his sentence, the twittering of birds was heard, many of them.

Suddenly the sky was black of birds, all trying to get their share of the food that the ottsels had prepared.

"Damn it. All these birds are going to kill us" one of the ottsels yelled.

"Oh no they won't" Buster said stubbornly and threw a bolt of purple eco at the birds, all of which fell to the ground dead.

Most of the ottsels were too terrified to move, they just stared at the dead birds in shock.

"What have we done?" Jingo asked, backing of from the birds.

"We have done what's needed for our survival! That's no sin" Buster said. "This is the start of a whole new era, an era where the ottsels are on top of the food chain, we rule this planet now!"

Some of the ottsels shook their heads, not wanting to take part in this while others listened eagerly.

"I have destroyed the precdators, and if these birds have a problem with us then they will die too. If any animal threatens you, carnivorous or vegetarian, I will personally kill them. This is for our future" Buster said.

A loud cheer was heard from the ottsel colony, but not everyone participated.

Even Snowrose looked away from her husband for a moment, and Balder glared at Buster, both he and his mother knew he had changed, and it was the dark eco's fault.


	6. Buster's biggest mistake

**Miss.Ecofreak: Here I am again with another chapter, although I was for a while worried that I hadn't gotten any reviews for the last one, but I got one now, so thanks lil Easy E;)**

**Zakura: Miss.Ecofreak can update quicker you know, she's just got broadband and near free access to the internett and she's got 17 finished chapters.**

**Miss.Ecofreak: I just like to get reviews first. So I've decided I'm going to update the fic as soon as I've gotten at least one review. But now enough talking, enjoy the next chapter.**

**CHAPTER 6**

**BUSTER'S BIGGEST MISTAKE**

"I'm leaving you".

Buster turned around abruptly, and saw Snowrose in the door of his home office, with two trunks on each side and Anny and Balder right behind her.

"Excuse me?"  
"You heard me. I'm sick of this "miracle eco". I'm taking the kids and leave for another village" Snowrose said, the two young ottsels nodded in agreement.

"But… you can't just leave! Who's going to protect you?" Buster asked.

"There are no precdators around remember? You've made sure of that" Snowrose said, her voice made it clear she didn't like the destruction of the predators.

"There are still precdators outside our borders" Buster said.

"So I'll bring some blue eco to get away from them. There's no need for any more arguments, I've made up my mind" Snowrose said and turned to leave.

"Wait!"

Buster grabbed Snowrose's arm.

"Let go of me!"

"Please don't leave me. Have you forgotten how you felt when we married?"

"What I felt back then doesn't matter. The ottsel I fell in love with is gone".

She let go of her trunks and simply ran trough the door, quickly followed by her offspring.

"Mom! What about our stuff?" Anny asked.

"Never mind that. We'll get new toys when we get to Mountain-Lake Town" Snowrose said.

"But the stuffed chinbit dad gave me is in that trunk!" Anny cried.

"Then I'll get you a similar one! And don't even mention your father ever again!" Snowrose yelled.

Balder felt that was going a bit too far, but he didn't say anything.

He understood that his mother was sad, but Anny didn't understand much about what was going on.

On their way to the tunnel exit, the three ottsels passed the large factory where the dark eco was being made, Snowrose stopped for a second.

"Wait here kids. I'm going to pick up some blue eco" she said and ran into the building.

Balder and Anny had no intention of getting into the building, Anny was scared that if she went in there she would become a monster like her father but waited patiently outside.

"Do you think mom will become bad too when she walks in there?" she asked her brother.

"Of course not. That only happens if you touch the dark eco. See, there she comes" Balder said.

Snowrose came out through the main door with a bottle of blue liquid in her arms.

All of a sudden Balder got the feeling something was wrong.

"Mom! Get out of there!" he yelled.

Snowrose just looked at him puzzled for a second or two, and then the eco-factory started glowing in a scary purple light.

Before Snowrose had time to react the entire building collapsed on her in large bolts of purple and dark blue.

"MOM!" Anny yelled and started to run towards the building until someone grabbed her tail and threw her in the other direction.  
"Don't be silly girl come here!"

Anny and Balder ran away from the crater and out into the forest around, they hardly had time to look at whoever grabbed Anny's tail.

Their survival instinct kicked in, and all they thought about was to get away.

Not until they could no longer see the purple flames that were now erupting from the tunnel entrance Anny and Balder decided it was safe to stop running.

"What-what happened?" Anny said as tears came streaming.

"The purple eco got mixed with the red, which must have caused the explosion" someone said.

Balder looked around and was surprised to see his father, looking just as shocked as they did.

"What do you mean? You knew this was going to happen?" Balder asked.

"No! I had no idea! I just thought the eco would get stronger if I mixed them… I just wanted… if we got stronger we could…."

"Wreck the planet even more?" a new voice asked.  
Rambo and Otto came towards them, but as soon as they got near Rambo collapsed.

"See now what this miracle potion of yours caused? You got power and destroyed the precdators but now Tunnel Town is destroyed!" Rambo said. "And I'm terribly tired!"

Otto shook his head.

"Rambo. You've got to be the only ottsel in the world who can see your own village blow up and then complain about tiredness" he said.

"What happened to the villagers?" Buster asked.

"Most got away. But quite a lot died." Otto said.

"Man I need a fish" Rambo said from the ground.

"Can you for one second think about something else than food?" Buster complained.

"Where's mommy?" Anny asked.

Neither Rambo nor Otto answered, nor did Rambo complain about tiredness and hunger anymore.

**Miss.Ecofraek: changes was made to this chapter, Otto wasn't in the original version (that was deleted, grumble)**

**Zakura: suits you for having such bad grammar**

**Miss.Ecofreak: as if you can do better?**

**Zakura: I eat grammar**

**Miss.Ecofreak: okay fine, please review **


	7. The Dark Maker

**Miss.Ecofreak: hiya, sorry for not updating in four days even though I said I would but but our stupid computer had a virus infection**

**Zakura: it's not the computer's fault**

**Miss.Ecofreak: (ignore) so I couldn't use the internett at home anymore! But now it's gone... mostly so here's a new chapter, and the next one will be up soon (providing another virus doesn't come by)**

**CHAPTER 7**

**THE DARK MAKER**

Mountain-Lake Town was quite a lot bigger than what Balder was used to, but he still felt a bit trapped by not being able to walk out.

There were still predators in the mountains, but Buster had no intention of doing anything about it.

Nobody heard much from Tunnel Town in years; most precursors who went there meant it had a creepy feeling to it, as if it was haunted.

"There's no one there" Rambo once said to one of his new friends. "What are you afraid of?"  
"I don't know" his friend Willy replied. "But it's like… when I went down there, there was nothing but a big hole in the ground where the town used to be, the buildings were ruined, bones sticking up from the ground. But still I felt as if I was being watched".

"By ghosts you mean?" Balder asked. "They're not real".

"I know! That's what I try to tell myself!" Willy said but he didn't seem to believe it.

"Hey! It's a big hole, we've heard that now" Rambo said. "But there must be some way to rebuild it. We just dig further into the caves or something, perhaps we could make a tunnel from Tunnel to Mountain-Lake, and then we would get the biggest ottsel-town ever!"

"No thanks" Willy said.

"Very well. What do you think bro?" Rambo asked his brother.

"Do as you like" Buster said uninterested.

"Oh come on. Try to sound a bit enthusiastic at least!" Rambo said. "Its three years ago! Even Anny's gotten over it! How long are you going to mourn?"  
"For as long as it takes. Okay?" Buster said.

"Takes to what? Do you think Snowrose is going to rise from the dead if you cry long enough?" Rambo asked.

"Will you drop it?" Buster said.

"Fine. Do it your way. Come on Balder, want to go ghost hunting?" Rambo asked and ran out the door before Balder had time to answer.

"Are you just going to let them run out like that?" Willy asked.

"Hey! Balder's a big boy now. He can look after himself" Buster said stubbornly.

Getting to Tunnel Town was no easy matter.

Balder and Rambo had hardly taken two steps outside the tunnel entrance, which was hidden behind a large shrubbery, before a large precdator came running at them.

The two ottsels had brought blue eco, so at least they could run away.

As they were approaching Tunnel Town however, the precdator stopped dead and turned around.

"What's his problem?" Rambo asked.

"I don't know. Maybe he still thinks there's more ottsels around here that kills precdators?" Balder suggested.

"That was a young precdator, hardly over a year old. He wouldn't know anything about the purple-eco" Rambo said.

The ruins of Tunnel Town were clearly visible through the threes now.

If he hadn't known better, Balder would have thought it was the ruins that scared the precdator, because they were scary.

The entire cave had a dark era flowing around it, dark eco was in fact flowing freely and there were no animals to be seen, not even insects.

"Ah, home, creepy home" Rambo said. "Wonder if the old pub is still open?"

"You don't want to go down there do you?" Balder asked.

"Why not? It's only a big abounded hole in the ground. Nothing to be afraid of, just don't step into the eco" Rambo said.

And so they went, into the hole which three years earlier had been a prospering town.

Tunnel Town looked just as bad as Willy described it, if not even worse.

The whole place had a creepy feeling to it, purple smoke lay over the dark eco lakes and more than once, Balder thought he saw someone hiding behind the building, or splashing in the water, as if it was something alive swimming in it.

"Okay, no we've seen it. Can we go now?" Balder asked.

"Why? Is my little nephew scared?" Rambo asked.

"Of course not" Balder said quickly. "But this is boring. There's nothing her but mist and broken houses"

_And ghostly figures_ he added in his head but he didn't say it out loud.

"Look! There's your old house!" Rambo said. "Come on, maybe we can find Anny's old chinbit-toy!"  
The house was nearly intact, but the paint was fading and it had purple spots on the walls.

Inside it looked just like it had done when they left it, except the half-eaten fish that Buster had been eating was missing.

Weird. Balder would have expected it to be filthy, but it was entirely spotless, as if time had stopped in this small house.

Only the view outside the windows had changed.

The kitchen however, was a mess.

All the cupboards were opened; plates were lying all over the floor, crushed.

All the food was gone, just as well because if it had been there it would stink horribly inside the house.

Anny's room looked as usual, the stuffed chinbit was lying on its regular spot at Anny's bed, close to her other stuffed toys, although no one had ever taken them out of the trunk.

"There it is. Let's get it, I'm sure Anny will be glad to see it again" Rambo said and picked up the toy.

Just as he did that, a hissing sound was heard.

"Er... Balder? That's not funny" Rambo said.  
"It wasn't me!" Balder said.

He turned around and screamed very high-pitched.

Rambo of course had teased Balder for years after this although he sounded much the same afterwards.

In the door was a most bizarre creature, almost twice the size of the ottsels.

It had the dark-purple color of dark eco and looked more like a machine than a living thing.

"Nobodyzz allowed into the housezzz" the creature said. "None except thozze who cleanzzz, you did thizz?"

The creature held one of the broken plates.

"Er… no… of c-course not. Actually we came in by accident, we are leaving now" Rambo said and walked sideways out of the door behind the creature, clutching the chinbit-toy to his back.

But the creature noticed he was hiding something, and pulled the toy out of his hands.

"Drop it! That's my sister's!" Balder yelled.

But something unexpected happened as soon as the creature could have a look at the toy.

He hissed and dropped it.

"That toy is outlawed! You're with the lionheadzzz aren't youzzz?" it said.

"No we're… who?" Rambo asked.

The creature pulled out a small device from a pocket on his foot.

"Zpiezzz in the creatorzzz' houzze! Calling all devicezz!" it hissed.

Balder and Rambo figured it was time to go, forgetting everything about the chinbit toy they ran for the door.

But as soon as they got outside, they were surrounded by even more dark robots.

"Hold your fire!"

The new voice didn't come from any of the machines, it sounded more like an ottsel, and so it was.

It came walking out from the ranks of robots, the fur was dark blue and sparked of dark eco, but apart from that the ottsel looked very normal considering what it must have been through.

"Well what do we have here? Buster's brother and son, so where's the boss himself?" he asked.

"Jingo? What happened to you?" Rambo asked.

"So you remember my name after all these years. I have evolved Rambo, dark eco is the future. It made me and many others into what we are today, all-mighty!" Jingo said.

"Almighty? Then what about all those?" Rambo asked pointing to the bones sticking out around them.

"Some couldn't cope with the changes. But that's life, the weaker ones die sometimes, the Lionheads didn't like it much of course" Jingo said.

"Who are the Lionheads?" Balder asked.

"Wild beasts" Jingo snarled. "They live out in the forest near by, just never dared to come down as long as the precdators were here so we thought they had died out."

"Chinbits" Rambo whispered. "The Lionheads are chinbits!"

"Wow, the rodent has intelligence" Jingo said. "That was unexpected."

"What are you talking about creep? I am an ottsel just like you" Rambo said.  
"Oh well that's where we don't agree mister. I have evolved from ottsel-state, I am now the creator of life, and I created these didn't I?" Jingo said waving his hands at the robots behind him. "I've created lots more creatures if you want to see them, and then there's the little pets my friends made, really cool"

"If you're not a precursor, what are you?" Rambo asked.

"Me little friend? I am the ultimate, the leader of the Dark Makers" Jingo said.

**Miss.Ecofreak: just a little note before we stop, the robots appearing in this chapter are NOT metalheads, they'll appear in the next chapter.**

**Now please review.**


	8. XD03

**CHAPTER 8**

**X-D03**

Now that the "strangers" was captured, some of the "biological creatures" Jingo had talked about came crawling out of their hideouts in the broken buildings.

They weren't pretty; some looked as if they were struggling only to stay alive as they crawled on six and some even 7 feet and gasped for air, although there was nothing wrong with the air around them.

"What do you call that?" Rambo asked.

"Early experiments" Jingo said. "Not very successful as you can see. Their lungs aren't fully evolved; they rarely live for more than a few months."  
"Disgusting" Rambo said. "And these robots?"  
"They work as guards" Jingo said. "Looks after the animals, takes in sick ones and make sure spies don't get in".

"Where are you taking us?" Balder asked.

"You'll see" Jingo said and smirked.

Without warning, some strange creature crashed onto the ground in front of Balder and roared straight up in his face.

This creature didn't seem to have any problems breathing.

It looked like a combination between a slug and a giant beetle with metal covering its face.

It had a large mane around its neck, which looked like it was made out of bones.

The face consisted of a mouth with clearly visible sharp teeth, four vicious yellow eyes and a greenish glowing gem on its forehead.

The rear end had long insect feet and ended in a long scorpion-tail.

"What are these rats doing here? Are they lunch for the newcomer?" the creature asked.

"They are visitors X-MH02. Leave them alone" Jingo said.

"Mmm, they sure look tasty" X-MH02 said before it flew of again.

"What was that?" Rambo asked.

"If you think he was nasty, just wait. I'm pretty sure he'll get much bigger" Jingo said. "You got to admit you're impressed. But that's not all I wanted to show you."

He led them into the dark eco factory, which had been rebuilt.

The outside looked like it always had done, but the inside was a different matter.

Where it once used to be dozens of work-places where ottsels were working with chemistry stood now long lines of glass tubes, each containing a strange liquid.

Balder looked closer at the tubes and gasped, there were animals inside the tubes!

Some looked more like fetuses than animals but it was clear what the dark makers were trying to do.

They were creating all new animal-species.

There were doors behind the tubes, where dark makers went in and out carrying injured or newborn animals.

"Impressive isn't it? Can't understand what the Lionheads have against this?" Jingo said. "Either way, they will soon be a long lost memory, thanks to what's in here".

He opened a door which said "No admittance".

In this room were three tubes, bigger than those in the hallway.

In two of them were two creatures that could not possibly live outside the tube, they already looked dead anyway.

But in the tube to the left was something that looked like a large snake or a lizard, twice a precursor's length.

The body was like a snake bright blue, and with darker stripes, it had four short feet and an unusually long thin tail, the tail had a purple brush on the end.

The head was like a lizard's; the nostrils were sticking up on the long nose.

The creature had its eyes slut, but Balder was sure he had slits for pupils, like a cat.

It had long ears which lay back, and between the two ears where two black horns which grew out on the top of the head.

"Beauty eyh?" Jingo said to his guests. "It'll be our strongest warrior. A real-life dragon!"

"What are those other things?" Balder asked.

"Forget them, they are failed experiments" Jingo said and pressed a button.

All the liquid and the creatures in it were flushed out of the two tubes to the right, leaving the dragon alone in the left tube.

"It's ready" Jingo said. "Ready to step into the world. It took two years for it to grow to this size and I think it's been ready for all that time. But we decided to wait a while so that it wouldn't be killed until it got time to grow up, but now we have decided to test it out".

"Test it? What do you mean?" Rambo asked.

"We have to check if it's up to the job" Jingo said. "If it's capable of killing. Luckily for us, two guinea pigs just entered our town" he added with a smirk and pressed a new button.

The liquid in the third tube was flushed out, but this time the dragon stayed in the tube as the glass was lowered.

Soon the tube was gone, leaving the dragon standing on its pillar, shaking the liquid of.

"I don't like this" Balder said.

"That's not the point either" Jingo said. "Go on X-D03 make me proud".

The dragon opened its eyes, the iris was blood red and the pupils, like Balder assumed, were slits.

It let out a cry like a distressed bird and charged at the two ottsels.

"Run!" Rambo yelled and ran for the door which was left open (Jingo obviously wanted to check the dragon's ability to catch its prey too).

As they ran down the hallway, more dark makers appeared to cheer at the dragon.

"When we get out in the city we'll have a chance" Rambo said. "There are so many fallen rocks; we can crawl under them while the dragon will be slowed down because it has to walk over them.

When they got out, the two ottsels quickly jumped into a hole which was too narrow for the dragon to follow, and the ground above had too many sharp rocks for anyone to just jump over.

"That'll keep him off our tails" Rambo said.

But he was wrong.

As the dragon came out of the door it revealed two new body-parts that the ottsels hadn't noticed while it was in the tubes.

Gigantic wings erupted from either side of the mid-part of the dragon's snakelike body, and it flew graciously above the rocks.

**Miss.Ecofreak: anyone who's guessed who X-MH02 is? He has appeared in one of the Jak and Daxter-games, but I'm not telling which one**

**Zakura: because she's an evil, evil dark maker herself**

**Miss.Ecofreak: but not so evil I won't update this. **

**If you wonder what the names of Jingo's pets mean;**

**XD03 stands for Experiment Dragon Nr 3. **

**XMH02 stands for Experiment Metalhead Nr 2**

**Please review, and I'll have the next chapter up soon.**


	9. The Village In the Trees

**CHAPTER 9**

**THE VILLAGE IN THE TREES**

As soon as he saw the ottsels emerging from the holes they hid in, it let out a blast of dark eco **(it doesn't breath fire it breaths eco! That makes sense seeing it is a dark eco-dragon)**

"Run!" Rambo said again.

"You don't have to tell me twice" Balder said and only just avoided the dark eco beam.

They climbed up the walls of the tunnel to get out in the open, constantly jumping into holes in the sand walls to avoid the dragon's eco-breath.

It was only just that they managed to get to the top, but now that they were in the open it was even easier for the dragon to hit them.

"It must run out of energy soon" Rambo said. "It's young. It can't have much muscle."

What XD lacked in muscle-power, it made up for with enthusiasm.

Every now and then it screamed with joy, proving it actually enjoyed this.

It flew down and before Balder had time to react, he felt a sharp pain in his tail.

The dragon had grabbed him, and tried to pull him backwards.

"Hey! Let go of my nephew abomination!" Rambo said and tried to hit the dragon with a stick.

XD's reaction was to pull Balder off his feet and toss him into a nearby tree.

Balder tried to get up and run away, but his tail hurt so much he lost balance, the dragon came charging at him again and this time it grabbed his left foot and arm.

"I said leave him!" Rambo yelled again.

But for X-D03, he might as well be shouting "go on", cause he had no intention of stopping.

But suddenly something happened that took away the smile on the dragon's face.

A large bolt hit it, as if someone had thrown a fire bolt at it.

The dragon hissed, dropped Balder and flew back to Tunnel Town.

Rambo and Balder looked in the direction where the bolt had come from.

There was an animal, fuzzy like them and holding a large black pipe.

The animal had a very round body, and a fluffy squirrel-tail sticking out back.

Its back legs were designed for jumping, with fur covering even the soles. **(Zakura: just like me!)**

The front feet were like hands; those hands were now gripping the black pipe, which obviously was a weapon.

The head looked like a rabbits head, complete with the long ears.

Around the head it had a lion mane, making it look quite majestic even though it was a few inches shorter than Balder and Rambo were.

"I can't believe it" Rambo said.

The animal put the pipe in a bag next to him and turned to the ottsels, mostly to Balder.

"Hey! Are you alright?" he asked.

"I… I really don't think so" Balder gasped.

The chinbit walked/jumped up to him and examined his tail and feet.

"This doesn't look good; you need to come back to the village. Hey you!" he shouted to Rambo. "Give me a hand".

Rambo ran up to the two and lifted Balder's feet and tail while the chinbit took the front end with one hand.

With the other he pulled out a tiny box with an antenna sticking out of it.

"Hello? This is Lio, I've got an injured ottsels here who needs immediate medical care, he's been attacked by one of the dark maker's new toys" he said into the box.

And as a surprise for the two ottsels, the box answered back.

"We'll come with a medical transport as quickly as possible, but right now everyone's occupied. You'll have to walk towards the village and we'll meet you" it said.

"Thank you" Lio said and put the box back in the pocket on his belt.

"A communicator" he said as he saw the ottsels' puzzled faces. "Helps me communicate with other chinbits even at the other end of the planet."

"Amazing!" Rambo said.

"Better save your excitement for later, here's the transport" Lio said.

Something that looked like a small flying house came towards them in a hurry.

It stopped dead in front of the two ottsels and one chinbit.

A couple of other chinbits jumped out of the transport.

"Oh no. this sure doesn't look good" one of them said as he helped Balder get into the transport. "We need to get to the hospital this instant. But still I don't think we'll be able to save this leg".

"Can't save it? What do you mean?" Balder asked.

"It means we'll have to amputate it. Your tail and left arm looks bad too but the right hand we might be able to save" the chinbit said casually as the transport started moving.

"Amputate? You mean cutting it off?" Balder said, sounding slightly frightened.

"Don't worry my new friend. You'll get used to it. We might not even have to go that far but we'll see… oh, we're there" the chinbit said.

The transport had stopped and its doors were opened to a sight Balder and Rambo had never seen anything like.

It was a chinbit city, looked much like the precursor cities only more advanced and all the houses were built into the enormous trees.

The house they had stopped by looked much bigger than the others.

The front sign said "Lion Head Clan Hospital" in the ancient precursor language **(Chinbits and ottsels use the same letters makes it easier for ME, who doesn't have to make up anything new :p)**

"Whoa, this is huge" Rambo said.

"That's so chinbits who are attacked by predators doesn't have to die before there's any doctor available" Lio explained. "We have gotten far in medical research; many chinbits actually make a living out of working at the hospital."

"They work here? But how about when they try to gather food? Won't that be very exhausting if they have to work all day at the same time?" Rambo asked.

"Of course not. They just buy food from the food-gatherers, they have a store lower down the branches" Lio said and pointed at a smaller building bellow.

The sign on this house said "Left Branch Leaves", and a lot of chinbits, young and old, jumped in and out of the doors.

Inside the hospital it looked nothing like the wooden hut it was on the outside. All the walls were white, with long corridors stretching here and there through the large trunk; some even looked as if they went through the branches, and linked this tree to many others around.

Balder was placed on a bed with wheels, and was taken to a room called "Predator-injuries".

Three doctors and one nurse helped doing the operation, and in a matter of hours Balder was awake, he had been anesthetized throughout the operation, now with only one arm, one foot and no tail.

"How am I supposed to live with this?" he asked the doctors. "You might as well let the dragon eat me!"  
"Relax Balder. Our technicians are making artificial limbs as we are talking" the doctor said. "I promise you that tomorrow you'll be running around like you were six years old again".

"I am five" Balder commented.  
"Still, you'll be fine" the doctor said and left.

Rambo had been standing by Balder's bed during the whole operation, not moving an inch, and was now staring at his nephew as if he was an extremely interesting TV-show. (If the ottsels had TV)

Balder sighed.

"Go on. Say it. I look ridiculous don't I?" he asked.

"I was about to say "psychically challenged", but if you prefer to be called ridiculous I can…"

"Shut it" Balder growled.


	10. Returning Home

**Miss.Ecofreak: Wow I like broadband, how many times have I updated this fic today Zaku-chan?**

**Zakura: I dunno. I'm busy. (Is seen building something)**

**Miss.Ecofreak: ... what are you doing?**

**Zakura: setting up a trap for Sasuke-kun (an character from the anime Naruto that Zakura loves, he ran away) **

**Miss.Ecofreak: keep your strange hobbies to the dork-fics. Here's the next not-excactly-new chapter**

**CHAPTER 10**

**RETURNING HOME**

Two days had passed since the accident with the dragon, and Balder was now standing on his own for the first time since the attack.

"Told you you'd be fine" Doctor Freddy said.

Balder just looked down at his feet, one was completely made out of metal and although the chinbits had tried to make it look like a regular ottsel-foot, it was still metallic grey and showed the reflection of a very displeased ottsel.

"What if it rusts? I like swimming" he said.

"Don't worry. It'll last for a lifetime" Freddy said happily. "Soon you won't even know it's different from the other".

This didn't make Balder happier, not only did his foot look like a star wars-prop (if he had known about Star Wars), but his left arm too, as well as his tail.

At his right hand two fingers were missing, he had refused the chinbits to make any artificial fingers; he didn't want to look more like a freak than necessary.

"You look awesome, like a super robot or something" Rambo said.

"Like those "super robots" Jingo had?" Balder asked.

"No… not like those. More like the complete opposite. I wish I had metallic limbs like those" Rambo said.  
"No problem. Let's switch" Balder said.

"Stop moaning. Lio has already gone of to Mountain Lake Town to tell your father and sister what happened, we better get going soon too"

"You go. I'd rather die here"

"Balder…"

"No"

"Anny will be sad"

Balder kicked a passing beetle down from the tree. "I don't want to go back. I'm a freak!"

"No you're not. In fact you're lucky. If we hadn't found you, you would have died" Freddy said. "I'm sure the other ottsels will be very impressed when they hear about you fighting a real dragon and lived."  
"Besides, those metal-paws will make you popular amongst the girls" a new voice said.

An albino chinbit jumped down from a higher branch.

It wasn't hard to tell he had been through a lot; he had one food, two hands, and half of his face, including one ear replaced by the same metallic substance Balder's artificial limbs was made of. **(His face resembles Cyber Errol, giggle)**

"Joey Lop-Lionhead here, first chinbit to ever get artificial limbs" the newcomer said, shaking Balder's real hand. "I was attacked by a draco-bird, and a precdator and a tree wolf **(a wolf living in a tree, a chinbits worst nightmare)**… bad day. But the new technology saved my life! My love-life too I must add".

"Good for you" Balder said, pulling his hand back. "But you're not me".

"Hey, lighten up. As soon as you get back home no one's going to care about your… defects. I'm sure your mother will be very glad to see you alive" Joey said.

"My mom's dead" Balder said, staring into the tree-trunk.

"Oh… I'm sorry to hear. But I heard you still had your father, and a sister? Don't you think they'll miss you?" Joey asked. "I know mine did. My little brother wouldn't let me out of sight one minute, and that's embarrassing I tell you. How was I supposed to attract mates with a two month-old baby attached to my tail?"

Joey laughed at the thought. Balder did not laugh.

"They were worried sick about me already" Joey continued. "With all white fur I wasn't really hard to find for predators, I guess that's why I was attacked so many times. There are albinos in ottsel-society too right? So you must know what I'm talking about."

"Will you shut up?" Balder asked.

"Sure. Just go home and you won't see me again" Joey said. "Go home and make your family happy."

Balder sighed for like the 3000. Time that day.

"Fine. I'll go if you're so obsessed with getting rid of me" he said, walking towards his uncle.

"I didn't' mean it that…"

"I think he's got the point, thanks for all help" Rambo said, grabbing Balder by the artificial arm and pulled him into the transport that was waiting for them. "Bye everyone. Be sure to visit some day".

There was a large welcome-party waiting for the two ottsels at home.

Buster seemed to have less fur than usual and was shivering as Balder came out of the chinbit-transport.

"Balder! Thank god you made it! I was so worried! How dare you just run of like that!" he yelled and grabbed his son.

"Dad… I can't breathe! And I didn't really "run of", I'm full grown" Balder said.

"You look awesome brother!" Anny said. "Do you have rockets hidden in that arm?"  
"Er… no, I don't think so" Balder said as he had managed to break free from his father's arms.

"It's all my fault" Buster said. "If I hadn't been so obsessed with power… if I never made the dark eco… I should have seen this coming."  
"Hey. Nobody knew what was going to happen" Rambo said. "Maybe except for Otto, but then again you never believed in soothsayers."

"You're not really helping" Buster said.

"Well that's not what brothers are for is it?" Rambo asked, raising an eyebrow at Buster.

"Don't worry dad. I'm okay, honestly" Balder said.  
"That's not what you said back at Lionhead Village" Rambo whispered.

"But this is an amazing discovery!" one of the resident ottsels named Eddie said. "Chinbits still live in Lion Woods, I bet you must be the last colony right?" he asked Lio.

"Not really. There is one colony on Treetop Island, one in the Rex Dunes, one in the Mountain Lake Forest and the Angora Clan actually lives higher up in these very mountains" Lio explained. "And I bet there are even more clans deeper into the continent and on other continents too".

"Up here? How come we've never seen them?" Eddie asked who looked about ready to explode of excitement.

"Because you spend too much time in the tunnels, the Angora Clan's homestead, Teddy Hills, is on the other side of the mountain here, they live in caves."

"We have to explore that sometime" Eddie said.

"The chinbits are a much more advanced society than us, I'm sure we'll be able to learn a lot from them" Rambo said.  
"I don't think you'll be the only ones who'll learn a lot" Lio said. "The green, yellow, blue and red eco is an amazing invention, together we can achieve great things, and some day I'm sure we'll be able to defeat the dark makers and that dragon of theirs. That is, if you want to help us".

The chinbit looked in Buster's direction, Buster himself was very surprised.

"You want my help? But without me the dark makers would never be" he said confused.

"Everyone does mistakes every now and then, but you led the team that created the good eco. If you came with us to Lionhead Village, we could take it to the next level" Lio said.

Buster seemed unsure at first, but then he smiled, for the first time in 5 years.

"Okay. We'll make a great team" he said.


	11. A New Rose

**Miss.Ecofreak: I'm back! Did anyone miss me in those... like 10 hours I've been sleeping? I would have loved to opdate once more yesterday too, but it was late.**

**Zakura: three times in one day is still a lot of updating for one fic. Last time you did something similar you updated Dork Period, DorkX and the Ancient ones at once.**

**Miss.Ecofreak: more updates mean more reviews. Here's another chapter. (Update nr 1 22 of April)**

**CHAPTER 11**

**A NEW ROSE**

As the years went by, the ottsels grew into a more advanced society thanks to the chinbit-technology.

Mountain Lake Town had now expanded, and for two years the ottsels had been working on a tunnel mowing straight trough the mountain and into another cave-system at the other side, with help from the inhabitants of that cave-system.

This was the chinbit village of Teddy Hills, where the Angora-chinbit-clan lived.

The Angora-clan looked different from the Lionhead clan, but their technology was the same thanks to their advanced ways of transportation and communication.

The Lionheads had a mane around their necks, and most of them had large ears pointing upwards (although some had interbreed with the chinbits of Mountain Lake Forest, the Lop Clan, making their ears weak and flat to the head).

The Angora-Clan had tick coats to survive in the cold snow, their ears where small to prevent heat from escaping.

Buster had built a new laboratory in Mountain-Lake Town, and with help from a team consisting of both ottsels and chinbits, he was working on a weapon to defeat the dreaded X-D03.

Although Buster was scared of making the same mistake he did when he tried to defeat the predators around Tunnel Town, he still tried to experiment with small doses of dark eco.

"I think I might be able to stabilize it, maybe. Don't worry. I wont use it if it doesn't work" he assured Rambo.

"And how do you know if it works?" Rambo asked.

"I'm a scientist Rambo. We're testing it out on plants, dark eco seems to have an interesting effect on them" Buster pointed at a glass container, inside was a small pot with ten big plants in it, dead from low nutrition, the plants looked funny, they were completely purple, no other plants on the precursor-planet had that color.

"They started reproducing in an extreme rate" Buster said. "We planted two days ago, yesterday all of these were alive, but it became too crowded in the pot so they died over the night."

"Charming" Rambo said. "Might get useful if we ever got hungry and there were no plants around to eat".

"I don't think you want to eat these Rambo, they are still filled with dark eco" Buster said.

"Great. Now it has broken my appetite too" Rambo said.

"I'm glad it has some positive effects" Buster said and giggled.

Rambo glared at him for a moment, but decided to change subject.

"Have you figured out what to do with the dragon yet?" he asked.

"No" Buster said quickly. "I have no idea."

"Are you sure? Balder said you told him that you had a plan" Rambo said.

"He probably only said that so that you would stop yapping, obviously it didn't work" Buster said. "How about giving me some peace and quiet so I can think of something?"

"Fine, I'll leave the genius to himself then" Rambo said and walked out.

As soon as Rambo had left, Balder came into Buster's office.  
"Why don't you just tell him what we've been working on? He's going to figure it out sooner or later anyway" he asked.

"If I do he's only going to bother me even more, you have no idea how much he was yapping when I tried to create the eco" Buster said.

"Yeah, and that was a big success" Balder muttered

"Come on Balder, I've learned since then. And I'm pretty sure this will work" Buster said.

He pressed a button on his desk, and one of the walls in his office moved away, revealing a hidden cupboard behind it.

Inside was a glass container, with lots of wires attached to it, inside it was a big egg.

"Completely sure?" Balder asked.  
"Don't worry, even draco-birds have been known to befriend ottsels if they are the first thing they see when they hatch" Buster said. "And I've created this one using some of the DNA from draco-birds. I think that's what Jingo did as well, only he enhanced it with dark eco."

"And you haven't?" Balder asked with a hint of suspension in his voice.

"What are you taking me for? I've seen what damage that eco can do" Buster said, staring at his son's metallic foot. "I've used red eco, and some yellow and blue to make it faster. I even added some green eco so that it will heal quicker".

"Its going to need it, it'll have to fight a dragon that is a few years older than it" Balder said.

"Don't worry; I've got it figured out. See, with draco-birds the females are often the bigger, this one's been cloned from a female bird so it'll probably get bigger than the dark makers' male dragon."

Lio popped his head into the office.  
"What now?" Buster asked. He was getting pretty sick of all the interruptions.

"Excuse me if I interrupted something important" Lio said.  
"Of course not, I was only trying to save the world. What do you want?" Buster asked.

"We need some help to check over an injured tree wolf-cub some chinbit-children picked up close to Tunnel Town, we suspect it might have eco-poisoning" Lio said.

Buster sighed.  
"Hard to believe that a few years ago I was fighting to exterminate those wolfs, now I spend my time saving them" he said and followed Lio out to the wolf-cub.

Balder giggled; picking up tree-wolf-cubs seemed to be a habit the chinbit-children had.

An adult tree wolf was hardly higher than a chinbit when it stood on its four feet, but yet they where the most dangerous predator the chinbits faced.

But as cubs, they were almost mouse-size, and chinbit-kids found them cute.

Maybe it was the similarity between the two species.

The tree wolfs had the same lion-mane the Lionhead clan had, and it had the same fluffy squirrel-tale all chinbits shared.

The problem of course was that the cubs didn't stay cute and cuddly for long, and as they grew older, their predator-instincts made them dangerous.

Balder was about to leave the room when he heard a cracking noise.

He turned around, had something broken?

But he couldn't see anything, and there was the cracking noise again.

His attention now fell at the dragon-egg in the glass-container; it had two cracks on it.

Balder thought for a second weather he should get his father or not as something busted out of the egg.

The baby-dragon stared straight at his face, looking just as innocent and sweet as the tree-wolf-cubs, yet Balder knew from personal experience that it would grow into something far more dangerous than any natural predator on the precursor planet.

But she did seem different from X-D03.

The main difference was the color.

She was almost completely pink and had red stripes going down her back.

She had no horns, but it was probably because she was so young.

Next came the size, she was only half Balder's size, way smaller than X-D03.

Her eyes were blue, and looked like the worlds biggest puppy-eyes at the moment.

The dragon-child put its feet at the glass container and twittered like a bird, as if she was asking Balder to let her out.

"You know, I really should get going" Balder said.

The dragon whimpered.

"No really. Dad can help you when he gets back; he's just looking at an injured puppy right now so…."

Now the dragon started crying, it really didn't want to be left alone.

Although it was a big crime against Balder's survival-instinct, he walked up to the dragon and lifted the glass container of.

As soon as the container was removed, the baby-dragon jumped at Balder, and started licking him in the face like any other puppy.  
"Okay drop it little girl" Balder said and picked the dragon of his stomach. "Who knows what kind of deceases you carry?"

The dragon squeaked happily, its temperament was nothing like the first dragon he met. Maybe it was only the dark eco that made him evil after all? And this dragon might stay nice if she was raised around ottsels.

"I have to admit. You are kind of cute" Balder said. "But hey, you need a name, a better name than what of the dark makers' dragon."  
He thought for a moment of what could be a good name for the little dragon, and then he thought of something.

"I want to name you Rose, after my mother Snowrose" he said. "I'm sure she would like that."

The dragon twittered again, she obviously liked the name.

_Not even my mom could have disliked that one_ he smiled.


	12. Flying With The Pink Dragon

**Miss.Ecofreak: I never really got any reviews for chapter 11 but I got a new one for chapter 1 so I've decided to let that slip. Here's the 12. Chapter**

**CHAPTER 12**

**FLYING WITH THE PINK DRAGON**

"This has to be the stupidest idea you've ever had"

"Come on, does it really seem that vicious?"

"Does a baby-precdator look vicious?"

Just as Buster had predicted, Rambo was not thrilled of the idea of a dragon within the ottsel-colony, although mentioned dragon was no sleeping peacefully on Balder's lap, and Buster was writing a long list of why she wasn't and would never become dangerous, since Rambo had insisted of getting it written down.

"She is part draco-bird" Buster said. "And you know draco-birds raised around ottsels never attack their adopted family".

"Yeah, but it's also part precdator! And they do kill their adopted family if given the opportunity" Rambo said.

"What's the matter with you? You were always so optimistic about everything when we were kids, what made you so pessimistic?" Buster asked.

"A pessimist is only an optimist with experience" Rambo said. **(Thanks to my Garfield-diary for that quote)** "Dragons are killers, I've seen it!"

"That dragon was made for killing, but you saw it never turned to attack any of the dark makers" Balder said.

"Why do you protect it? It was your foot it took!" Rambo said.  
"Yes, but I don't blame Rose for what X-D03 did, it would be like blaming you for what Jingo did since we are all one species" Balder said. "Some ottsels are good, some are bad, and I believe dragons are just the same".

"Famous last words" Rambo said. "Or it will be after this".

"Don't worry, we'll keep the dragon in control during it's upbringing, if it ever gets out of control we'll just have to put it down" Buster said.

"If it doesn't get too big before that" Rambo said.

But as the years went by, Rose showed no signs of aggression towards the ottsels, but when she was two years old, she took on an adult precdator and killed it since it was attacking Balder.

Most ottsels and chinbits had gotten used to her and loved her; they said she was their biggest hope of ever defeating the dark makers.

But Rambo still wasn't sure.

Rose was already bigger than X-D03 was when Balder was attacked, and scouts had reported that the blue dragon's growth was slower than Rose's growth.

"I knew it! It's just like with the draco-birds!" Buster said. "If my calculations are correct, the two dragons will be equal in size in 6 months and a year from now Rose will have outgrown X-D!"

"How long did you say X-D was?" Balder asked.

"Around 6-7 feet long, not counting the tail" the chinbit-scout said. "The tail is only around 1 and half feet".

"And Rose is 5 feet and has a 1.7 feet long tail" Buster said. "Maybe it's time she gets some more combat training?"

Rose had earlier been trained to attack dragon-robots that the chinbits made or sometimes they managed to catch some of the dark maker's creations, most of them were members of a species they called "metalheads".

But Rose didn't find these fights actually fun, like D-X did, but she understood she had to do it for her friends.

Balder was even sure she was able to understand precursor-language, although her mouth and teeth made it impossible for her to actually speak.

"That thing has intelligence?" Rambo asked as Balder told him. "It's nothing but an overgrown draco-bird".

Rose hissed at that comment.

"I swear she must have some intelligence, she noticed you were insulting her just now" Balder said.

"Or "she" is just after the fish I just ate, and doesn't understand that even if the smell is still here I have no fish" Rambo said indifferently.

"Don't listen to him Rosy, he doesn't know you like I do" Balder said to his dragon-friend.

"Don't waste your time talking to it, moron" Rambo said.

Rose glared at Rambo.

"Ignore him. He'll soon see what you're worth" Balder said and took Rose outside.

Usually Balder wouldn't take more trips out of the tunnel than necessary to gather foot, but since Rose defeated that precdator he felt safe with her.

Rose was flapping her wings with joy and flew around above his head as they walked around the mountain-lake.

"Don't wear yourself out completely, you still have combat training later today" Balder joked.

It was pointless to say it anyway Rose could fly nonstop for two days without sleep, and even then she slept for only one hour before she was ready for more flying.

As the two got to a cliff, they could see the remains of Tunnel Town bellow.

Rose watched the crater with much interest, she had never been there before, but Balder had told her what was waiting down there and he was sure she understood.

"Do you want to see how it's like down there?" he asked.

Rose nodded; she had learned that was a way of being understood.

"Well, that'll have to wait. You might be able to fly down but for me the trip would take hours and we don't have time for that" Balder said.

Rose twittered and flew down; she laid down one of her wings on the ground, signaling to Balder to get up.

"Are you sure? You want to let me ride you?" Balder asked.

Rose nodded.

"I'm not sure about that Rose. You've never been ridden before, so I don't know if you can hold my weight".

But Rose only waved her head towards her own back again to tell Balder to get aboard, "I can handle it" she said in her own special language only Balder knew.

"Fine, I guess we can give it a try" Balder said and climbed up on the dragon's back.

It was soon clear that Balder had nothing to worry about.

Rose flew just as fine with him on her back as she did without, and flying was fun.

They took a few loops before they dived down the mountainside and down to the crater of Tunnel Town.

Balder made sure Rose kept them both hidden between the trees as they came close to Tunnel Town.

Even flying between the trees was no big deal for the young dragon, she withdrew her wings, flew sideways and dived under branches with style, making sure she and Balder didn't hit a tree or the ground once.

But as they got to a clearing, Balder signaled for her to stop.

"We'll have to walk from here, but be quiet so we're not discovered" he whispered.

Rose nodded to prove she understood, and slowly crept forward on her short feet.

Tunnel Town seemed to have grown a bit since last time Balder was there, but it still had a creepy atmosphere around it, even Rose shivered as they neared the crater.

"Well there it is my first home" Balder said. "Not much of a peaceful city is it?"

Rose threw her head backwards, to signal she wanted to get back.

"Good idea, we came, we saw, we went home" Balder said and started walking back towards the forest.

But the path home was soon blocked, as three black scorpions suddenly burst out of the ground before them, each had the greenish-yellow skull gem of a metalhead.

"Uh oh, busted" Balder said, and jumped up on Rose's back.

Rose took of and flew over the metalheads, but then even more flying metalheads arrived and flew straight at the pair.

Balder didn't remember anything more, before everything went black.


	13. To Fight Eco With Eco

**CHAPTER 13**

**TO FIGHT ECO WITH ECO**

When Balder woke up he stared straight into the face of a grinning Jingo.

"Nice of you to drop by Balder. Nice paws" he said and several other dark makers around him giggled.

Balder tried to get up, but noticed he was tied to the ground, Rose was tied up to a pole right next to him, growling and trying to get to Jingo.

"I don't know if you guys are smart or just copycats but that pet of yours looks quite nice" Jingo said. "You couldn't possibly believe that chick was going to beat XD did you? She couldn't even defeat seven tiny metalheads!"

Just then Balder noticed the frog-like metalheads who were standing right behind Jingo; they all stared at Balder as if he was a tasty snack, which for them he probably was.

"Why don't you ever rely on your own strength? Instead of making us both fight using monsters?" Balder asked.

"Balder my friend, if we used our own strength you'd be dead in seconds, by using these stupid animals we ensure we won't get bored" Jingo said.

Rose suddenly became much angered, she started growling and howling at something behind the metalheads and it didn't take long for Balder to see what made her so angry.

XD had come in, and he was way bigger than Balder remembered, but as the scouts had reported, he was only a few feet longer than Rose.

At first, the blue dragon seemed surprised at the new arrival, but quickly he started growling back.

"Relax Draco-boy, don't burn down the room" Jingo said. "Perhaps it's time to see who's the strongest? We have our own stadium that is eco-proof".

This was not good, Rose hadn't grown enough yet, she was just a child **(well, XD is a child too: p)**

"What's wrong little weasel? Have any objections, oh wait. It doesn't matter what you say, you are our prisoner" Jingo said. "Prepare the arena!" he said to two robots nearby. "And get pinky over there ready for battle".

The robots grabbed the rope holding Rose, and whatever she did to get loose was in wane, these robots had super-strength.

Balder was released and carried into the arena too.

It was a large cave built into the mountain in which Tunnel Town was set underneath.

Balder was placed in a chair next to Jingo, far up in the hillside.

XD flew into the arena and placed himself at one side of it and waited for his opponent, apparently he had done this before, many times.

Rose was tied to a pole on the other side, and growled towards XD, but the male didn't move.

He just stood there watching her, with an evil grin on his face.

"Time to see who's got the strongest dragon" Jingo said and gave a signal to the robots down at the stadium. "Release Pinky" he said to them.

The robots cut the chain holding Rose and she wasted no time, she charged at XD with the same rage she had shown while attacking the precdator last year.

Although Balder didn't know much about dragon language, he understood that the dark dragon must have insulted her badly.

XD taken back at the sudden attack, apparently he had never fought anything that fought back with such stench, but he quickly came to his senses and slashed Rose with his tail.

Rose was ready; she grabbed the tail and threw the blue dragon (still by his tail) into the wall.

"Come on Rose" Balder said.

Jingo was not happy.

"Don't start the party yet" Jingo said. "You haven't seen all XD can do yet" he said.

Now XD was angry, he lifted of the ground and flew straight over Rose.

Rose followed him, eager to get a hold on his tail again.

They started circling the arena for a few seconds, getting closer and closer to each other until they were both in biting range.

Rose grabbed XD's tail again, but this time he was ready.

He turned around, facing Rose who was still holding on to his long tail, and bit her neck.

Rose cried and let go of the tail.

"Good boy! Now finish her of!" Jingo yelled.

XD forced Rose down to the ground; Balder could see she was bleeding.

"Don't give up Rose, please" he whispered.

"What's your problem? A weak dragon is nothing to keep" Jingo said. "This is how we train up all our metalhead-warriors, we put in two metalheads and the winner gets to eat the looser, that way he gets a price too".

Balder glared at Jingo, how could he do this? The dragons were living animals, he couldn't just…

His thoughts were interrupted by a new cry.

Rose was getting weaker, she could hardly stand up, and DX showed no intention of letting go of her neck.

"Stop it now! You've proved your point!" Balder cried to Jingo.

"Please, I'm actually doing you a favor disposing of this useless reptile" Jingo said. "This is XD's special move, you should be proud; most of his opponents would be dead by now".

This was more than Balder could handle, for the first time in his life he wanted nothing but to kill this ottsel sitting next to him.

Without warning he charged at Jingo, pushing both of them down from their chairs and down the hillside.

But the dark eco had given Jingo more strength, safely down at the ground; he kicked Balder of so he fell into DX.

"Let go of that stupid female, she's almost dead anyway. Take him first" Jingo said and pointed at Balder.

XD dropped Rose who fell to the ground immediately and turned to Balder.

_This is it, I'm coming mom._ Balder thought, he closed his eyes waiting to feel the enormous dragon-teeth crushing all he had left of bones.

But it never came, instead he heard a new bird-like cry, this time it came from XD.

Balder opened his eyes; Rose had somehow got to her feet and had grabbed XD by the neck, just like he had done earlier.

"How is it able to stand?" Jingo asked.

"Probably because of a force you know nothing about" Balder said. "Friendship".

Rose didn't wait to deliver the death blow, she threw XD away into the wall, grabbed Balder (careful not to hurt him) and flew out of the arena.

"Stop them! They're getting away!" Jingo cried.

Several flying metalheads came out of their caves around the arena; Rose managed to avoid them out of cheer luck since she wasn't exactly flying straight after loosing all that blood.

"They're still tracing us" Balder said.

Rose fell to the ground again, exhausted.

"No Rose, don't give up yet, we're almost there" Balder said.

Rose whimpered, and got to her feet, but Balder still had to halfway drag her trough the caves with the metalheads following quickly.

But suddenly they all turned around, scared of something behind Balder's back.

Balder turned around to see what it was.

A small army of Lionhead-chinbits were in the cave opening, each holding a lethal gun in their hands.

Lio was there too.  
"Buster told me you were missing, so we figured we might go looking for you" he said. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine. But Rose is badly injured" Balder said.

Lio walked over to check the wound, he pulled a bandage out of a bag he had tied around his waist and covered the wound with it.

"This will stop the bleeding, but we need to get her to the village if she shall heal properly. Help me carry her to the transport" he said.

It took Balder and seven chinbits to carry the injured dragon, since she had lost all strength to walk on her own.

"No more expeditions until we know you're up to the task, okay girl?" Balder said to Rose.

Rose only twittered, and fell asleep in his arms.

**Miss.Ecofreak: Done with another chapter. How'd you like that?**

**Zakura: Will Rose and Balder get married?**

**Miss.Ecofreak: what the? NO! They're two different species!**

**Zakura: Can he marry me then?**

**Miss.Ecofreak: You're two different species too. I thought you liked Sasuke?**

**Zakura: He doesn't have to know**

**Fluffy the Killer Hamster: then what about me?**

**Zakura: fine, so we had some fun (and five kids) but that doesn't have to mean I LIKE you**

**Fluffy: Gasp! I'm hurt!**

**Miss.Ecofreak: not funny. Please review.**


	14. Big News

**Miss.Ecofreak: Oh damn! I was supposed to have updated this earlier, I really planned on it but the computer got some sort of virus... again.**

**Zakura: no wonder as you and your brother takes turn on the pc and sits on the internet almost the whole day!**

**Miss.Ecofreak: er... right. This chapter is called Big News, and I've got some big news about my life as well, I'm going to get a new rabbit!**

**Zakura: (gasp!) don't you love me anymore?**

**Miss.Ecofreak: of course I do (otherwise I would have sold you and got a new one already)**

**Zakura: reasuring...**

**Miss.Ecofreak: But I would never give up you Zaku-chan. My other rabbit is a rex, black rex, he's so cute**

**Zakura: he?**

**Miss.Ecofreak: so NOW you're intrested. Anyways, here's the next chapter and Anny's got some big news for you as well.**

**CHAPTER 14**

**THE BIG NEWS**

It took Rose three months to fully recover, but after a long time of staying in bed (which for her meant a small box which was constantly replaced by a bigger box) she was back to her usual hyperactive happy self, as if the whole incident was forgotten.

Balder hadn't forgotten though, he had now seen what the dark makers could do, and started doubting whether Rose would ever gain the strength to defeat the dark dragon.

He watched as Rose played tag with some of the younger ottsels right outside the entrance to Mountain Lake Town.

She had actually grown much faster than his father had predicted, maybe it was the shook of meeting a bigger enemy that caused her growth to accelerate.

She had almost doubled in size in three months, now she was almost nine feet long but still she didn't harm the little ottsels no matter what they did to her.

Maybe Buster had added some genes to make her extra docile, Balder had never been much interested in science (especially not after what happened to his mother) so his father never bothered to explain anything to him.

"She sure is amazing isn't she?" someone behind Balder said.

He turned around and saw his father, he smiled at the dragon.

"One minute she's fighting metalheads, the next she's playing peacefully with the children. I guess we can say my experiment was a success" Buster said, putting extra pressure on the word "my".

"Did you want something?" Balder asked.

"Yes, in some ways. Your sister wants to tell you something" Buster said and stepped away.

Anny was standing right behind him; Balder was a bit surprised he hadn't noticed her before, with her blue color she was easy to spot out in the open.  
"Hi sis, how's it going?" Balder asked.

"Um… I'm fine" Anny said.

Buster seemed to be waiting for something.

"Go on honey. Tell him what you told me" he said.

"I didn't tell you anything, it was Kiko who couldn't keep his mouth shut" Anny said and turned her face away.

Kiko was one of Anny's old childhood-friends from Tunnel Town, one of the lucky survivors.

"Are you saying…?" Balder started.

"Yes Balder. We're getting married" Anny said happily.

"Anny! That's wonderful news!" Balder said.

"And here I was always thinking you would be the first one to settle down" Buster said.

It had been quite a while since Anny first started looking for "the one", but she hadn't had much luck.

Many of the male ottsels had been reluctant to bond very closely to her, because of her "disability" to hide from predators.

Ottsels rarely chose mates out of personality, because of the predators they had to think about the best for their children, and choose the mate that would be most likely to pass on good genes.

Most of Anny's old friends had let her down as she and they grew older too, as kids they never thought of the chance of being eaten by a bigger animal, but as they grew older and learned what the outside world was like, they started avoiding her, probably afraid of getting "too attached" as she was more vulnerable.

No one had ever considered her as a mate.

"When did you decide this?" Balder asked.

"Two hours ago actually. Quite straight forward, he said he'd always loved my wonderful personality, and didn't care even if we ended up having children with missing limbs, he would still love them as long as they had my temper" Anny said. "He even suggested making a camouflage-dress for me".

"Your mother would be so happy" Buster said. "I'm sure she's smiling now, wherever she might be".

"The wedding will be in a two months time. And you're all invited, you too Rosy" Anny said.

The dragon twittered happily and Anny giggled.

"You could have been the perfect best man, too bad you can't do speeches" she said, petting Rose between her horns.

"I should try to make a translation device for her sometime" Buster said. "It would be great to be able to know what she's really saying".

"Well I've got to go. I have to send out the rest of the invitations" Anny said. "Kiko insisted we'd invite his brother, though I don't see why, he probably won't show up anyway. See you later dad, Balder and you too Rose".

And then she went back into the tunnel, looking happier than she'd ever been since she left Tunnel Town.

"At least some of my genes can be passed on now" Buster said. "Haven't you got anyone special in mind Balder?"

"Dad, we've been through this. If I ever get a girlfriend you'll be the first to know (second after the girl of course)" Balder said.

"I know. But it's about time. You're almost ten years old" Buster said. "I married your mother when I was half that age".

"But Rambo is 17 and still he doesn't care about anything else than lunch" Balder commented. "And I've still got time".

Sure enough, ottsels had been known to have a very long life expectancy, although they evolved fast from birth.

In the past, an ottsel would be lucky to live to a thousand years **(I know, it's insane and probably completely impossible… but this is a fantasy-fic)** but now they could get three or sometimes even four thousand years old thanks to modern medicine.

The green eco might even increase they life even more, but as it had only existed for nine years no one knew for sure yet.

"Just make sure you'll be at the wedding" Buster said. "Who knows? Maybe "The One" will be there?"

"And maybe Rambo won't eat the entire wedding cake by himself. But don't worry. I won't miss my sister's wedding" Balder said.

Rose twittered in agreement.

"Rose comes too" Balder translated.

**Miss.Ecofreak: was that the worst chapter ever or what?**

**Zakura: now you're really optimistic**

**Miss.Ecofreak: I don't like to brag. Please review and I'll do my best to not take such long time before the next update.**

**Zakura: and maybe guinea pigs will fly**

**Miss.Ecofreak: now you're really optimistic**

**Zakura: no seriously! Look! (Points at a guinea pig that has just been taken by an eagle)**

**Miss.Ecofreak: oh no! **


	15. Return of the metalhead

**Miss.Ecofreak: I don't have much to say today so let's just start the festivities right away.**

**Zakura: and wreck them**

**Miss.Ecofreak: yeah well, that too**

**CHAPTER 15**

**RETURN OF THE METALHEAD**

Two months seemed to pass way too quickly for Balder, although it was Anny, not himself, who was getting married, he still felt as if it was his own wedding day.

"Are you sure everything is set?" he asked his father for like the 30. Time or so.

"Yes Balder. Unless you've ordered a circus without telling me everything has arrived" Buster said. "This isn't a royal wedding, and Anny wanted it to be just a simple wedding. With food and entertainment for all the guests who are coming."

Balder let out a sigh of relief, though he would probably ask again before the day was over.

Night arrived and it was soon time for the wedding, Balder had now asked if everything was clear 2398 times according to Rambo.

The wedding was held in a large underground hall, deep underneath the mountain, where the newly finished tunnel to Teddy Hills met Mountain Lake.

This cave was originally built for protection in case the underground village was to be attacked, but soon after making it, the playful ottsels figured its large space was perfect for parties as well.

Right now the cave had been decorated with banners in pink and light blue, which were Anny's favorite colors.

When the cave was built, the ottsels also planted several berry brushes in the middle, those had now grown together so they looked like a large berry tree, and the platform where Kiko and Anny were going to get united on was built on top of this tree, with several seats for the guests next to it.

Because of this platform, the tree had been dubbed the Tree of Matrimony by the villagers, and now there were three ottsels on the main platform; Anny, Kiko, and the village leader, Niko, who functioned as a priest in ottsel society.

Balder was sitting with his father and Rose on one of the smaller platforms right next to them, the one reserved for the bride's family.

Balder could see Kiko's family sitting on opposite sides.

Kiko's mother, Jill, his father, Chuck and even their youngest son, Mimo, who didn't look to happy to be there.

"Greetings friends from far and near" Niko said, especially looking at the chinbits amongst the guests as he said the word "far".

"We are gathered here today to witness the union of these two precursors. Kiko and Anny of the Tunnel Tribe.

We wish these two the best of luck and may their genes be passed on in all generations to come"

It was a large cheer amongst the audience; Balder noticed Mimo pulled out his tongue at Anny. No surprise. He had never liked her from the start.

But just as Anny and Kiko were about to kiss, a loud rumble was heard from above.  
Rose twittered nervously.

"I don't know Rosy, but I'm sure we'll soon find out" Balder said to her.

"Dude, do you understand what that dragon is saying?" Rambo asked in disbelief but before Balder had time to answer a gigantic blue beast fell through the roof and landed right next to the tree.

Balder quickly recognized the greenish yellow gem on its head.

"Metalheads!" he yelled. "Get out of here now!"

Balder jumped up at Rose's back and flew towards the middle platform to help his sister+ Kiko and Niko.

Buster pulled out a bottle he had kept in his inner pocket filled with yellow eco.

"You're not allowed to come here and ruin my daughter's wedding unpunished!" he snarled and threw a yellow fireball at the metalhead.

The metalhead cried as the bolt hit it, but apart from that it wasn't badly hurt from the hit.

Balder returned on Rose after he had brought Anny, Kiko and Niko to safety.

"Dad! Get out of there! Let Rose try" he yelled to his father.  
Buster agreed and headed for the smaller tunnels.

"Okay sweaty, I know this metalhead is way bigger than those you are used to fighting but give it your best shot alright?" Balder whispered.

Rose growled at the monster and flew towards its softer underside.

She fired a large bolt of yellow eco at the metalhead's stomach and dark eco started flowing from the wound immediately.

"Watch out!" Balder yelled pulling Rose's ears almost instinctively to make her turn away.

Rose flew away for cover and bit the metalheads long metal-covered tail.

The metalhead started shaking his tail rapidly to get rid of the annoying dragon hanging on to it; Balder had to fight for his life to avoid falling of Rose's back.

But the metalhead was smart, as soon as he realized the dragon wasn't letting go, he slammed his tail, with Rose and Balder attached to it, into the stone walls.

Rose let go of the tail only just in time and crashed into the wall, not hard enough to knock her out, but hard enough to make Balder fall of and land right in front of the monster.

"Balder!" Anny cried.

Balder looked up into four yellow eyes.

Then, to everyone's surprise, the monster talked.

"What do we have here?" he said and picked up Balder by his artificial leg.

"If it isn't the guinea pig" the metalhead laughed.

In surprise, Balder almost forgot to be afraid. "Guinea pig?"  
"Don't you remember me? I'm hurt" said the metalhead. "We've met before, remember?"** (Miss.Ecofreak: we've heard that phrase before, remember? Zakura: that's Kor alright)**

Balder looked at him, where on earth was he supposed to have met this horrible monstrosity before?

The metalhead let go of him, making him fall four meters and hit a pile of leaves that had fallen from the tree.

"X-MH02 they called me, I was supposed to be the dark maker's biggest hope in defeating you and those bushytailed bunnyrodents **(Zakura: I feel like adding (again): rabbits and rodents are two entirely different things. Rabbits are lagomorphs, rodents (chinchillas, mice etc) are… well… rodents)**, but no, they had other plans".

Suddenly Balder recognized the metalhead, he and Rambo had seen it the first time they came to Tunnel Town after the accident; though he had grown a lot.

"XD failed" XM continued. "He failed to exterminate you and your pathetic uncle ("Hey!" Rambo yelled) and then he failed to beat Pinky here too ("Snarl!" Rose added) but the makers don't give him up. No, everyone deserves a second chance, they say, but what about me? I never got a FIRST chance!"

"What's that got to do with us?" Balder yelled, he noticed that Rose had gotten a rock on her tail so she was unable to move.

Anny crawled out of the caves, trying to get to the dragon so Balder let XM talk, hoping the metalhead wouldn't notice his sister.

"You mean no one's told you?" XM asked. "Most metalheads are sterile; in fact, I'm the only one who's able to reproduce. All those little metalheads you've seen, they're all my offspring. But the dark makers are displeased with them, most are too small. But dragons are different; any dragon can mate and have children who are just like their parents in every way. But for that, they have to be two".** (Miss.Ecofreak: does anyone else but me think it's gross that Kor appears to be male but still seems to lay eggs?)**

"I think you're forgetting one thing metallo-maniac!" Rambo yelled from the caves. "The dark makers have only one dragon! And we're not planning on giving her up!"

_So the day has finally come for Rambo to protect Rose, who would know?_ Balder thought to himself.

"The dark makers are strong, they can take her any day they want" XM said. "Unless I kill her first".

But as the metalhead turned towards where Rose had been stuck only seconds ago, she was gone.

"Where's the…" XM started before a yellow ecobolt hit him in the back head.

He turned around slightly annoyed to see Anny, sitting on Rose in the Tree of Matrimony.

"You're going to regret ruining my wedding" Anny snarled.

**Miss.Ecofreak: oooo, Anny's mad.**

**Zakura: You won't like Anny when Anny's mad**

**Miss.Ecofreak: please review:D**


	16. Dark Eco Opposite

**CHAPTER 16**

**DARK ECO OPPOSITE**

XM didn't seem to be at all frightened by the sudden arrival.

"And what are you going to do about it midget?" he asked.

Anny pulled out a bottle of red eco that was hidden under a platform in the tree and fed it to Rose.

"You'll see" she said angry. "Go get him girl".

Rose charged at the metalhead for the second time, now sparkling of red eco and more determined than ever.

But XM was too fast and jumped out of the way before the dragon hit him.

Rose turned around quickly to avoid hitting the wall.

She fired a bolt of yellow eco at him again, somewhat mixed with red and it hit XM's metal covered tail.

"Don't think your feeble eco-powers can pierce through my metal" XM said laughing, and sent a beam of dark eco towards the two.

Rose tried to fly away, but was hit in one wing and fell to the ground.

"Hah! You're no match for me!" Xm said proudly.

Balder hurried over to Rose and pulled out a small bottle of green eco, he had in his pocked just in case, and used it to heal the dragon's wounded wing, one small cut remained that the eco couldn't heal, but it wouldn't keep her from flying.

"You've got to be quicker than that Rosy" he said silently. "And I know just how".

Out of his other pocket, he found an equally small dose of blue eco, which Rose quickly absorbed.** (Zakura: that's a lot of eco. Miss.Ecofreak: she'll be fine)**

This had a rather strange effect however,

Rose got to her feet and suddenly she started glowing!

The cut on her wing disappeared as if it was never even there and the usually pink dragon turned pure white with a light blue glow.

"What the…?" Balder said surprised.

"Hah! Don't think a little light can scare me!" XM said laughing.

Rose flew at him at an amazing speed, heading straight towards the metalhead's stomach.

XM was still laughing but stopped dead as the tiny dragon flew straight into him, tossing him into the opposite wall.

"What was that?" Buster yelled from his safe-spot.

"How did she get that strong?" XM asked, sounding equally puzzled.

Rose got ready to launch another eco bolt at him but before she could do that, the metalhead turned his tail and flew of trough the hole he had created.

Suddenly all the ottsels that had been hiding in the caves cheered and ran out.

Rose seemed more shocked than happy about her victory and flew straight across the other ottsels (who had been coming to greet her) and landed on Balder (knocking him over) just like she had done when she hatched.

She twittered nervously to him as Balder tried to move (the rather big) dragon from his stomach.

"I don't know what happened to you Rosy, are you feeling alright?" he asked.

Rose nodded, and Buster came towards them.

"That was amazing! All the eco she was channeling must have combined" he said.

"Combined? Meaning what?" Rambo, who had just arrived, asked.

Buster touched the dragon's skin, and the light blue spots started flowing on to his own arm, spiting out several sparks of dark eco that had remained in Buster's body after all these years.

"This is amazing!" Buster said again. "We've always tried to combine certain types of eco, but never tried to actually combine all of them!"  
"Dad, what's going on?" Anny asked. "What's this white stuff?"  
Buster bottled some of the "white stuff" that bounced around on Rose as she slowly was starting to regain her old color.

"This, everyone, is the stuff that's going to help us defeat the dark makers. Light Eco!" Buster said proudly and lifted the bottle over his head.

The bottle glowed just like Rose had done, but since the eco was bottled up, it didn't fade away, and it lighted up the entire cave, sometimes shifting between red, blue, green and yellow.

**Two weeks later**

There was just one problem with the light eco, ever since Rose spent all hers in a matter of one minute all that existed of it was the one bottle Buster had kept.

The bottle was now standing in Buster's laboratory, in the very same incubator which once contained the very first dragon egg** (XD wasn't hatched so Rose's egg was technically the first)**

At first it seemed like all that was needed was to combine four different kinds of eco, but after trying and failing (usually ending in an explosion) Buster realized it wasn't that simple to get the exact right amount.

He returned home to Balder and Rambo (Anny had moved out with Kiko) late at night, all covered in burnt marks.

"Let me guess, it blew up?" Rambo asked from the couch he was sitting in (or most likely lying down in)

"No. It just evaporated. Too much yellow eco I suppose" Buster said.

"Then… what about the burnt marks?" Rambo asked.

"This? Well… the cappuccino-machine exploded" Buster said before heading of to bed.

Rambo just stared at his back with a puzzled expression for a while, before heading for bed too. **(Miss.Ecofreak: wow, there are a lot of scary things going on in that laboratory. Zakura: ottsels have cappuccino? Miss.Ecofreak: now they have)**

Rose was curled up in a corner of the room; the ottsels had given up putting in a box for her to sleep in so now she just slept on the floor.

"You have no idea what all the fuzz is about do you girl?" Balder said to her.

Rose looked at him for a moment, and then nodded.

"I knew it" Balder said and bent down next to her. "Do you want to tell me how you did it?"

The dragon got up, nodding her head towards the cupboard where Buster stored the four types of eco, "just in case" he said.

Balder walked up to the cupboard and took out four bottles, each containing one type of eco, and placed them in front of Rose.

Rose looked at the bottles of some time, as she was trying to remember just how the eco had mixed in her own body, and then charged a blast of the draco-birds secret weapon.

A little biology-lesson might be useful here.

Draco-birds had a special ability to spit acid at their enemies if a precdator or a tree-wolf tried to steal their eggs.

Rose had inherited this ability, as she was part draco-bird and now she spited this acid at the four bottles.

The bottles broke immediately and literally exploded as the contents mixed with the acid.

Balder had to cover his eyes, Buster and Rambo came into the living room.  
"We heard a blast? What happened?" Rambo asked.

Balder didn't answer, he just stared at the corner where Rose was sitting, smiling, for in front of her lay a puddle of Light Eco.

**Miss.Ecofreak: okay, so that was maybe a bit quick, but at least it's progress**

**Zakura: birds that spit acid?**

**Miss.Ecofreak: That was not something I just made up if that's what you think. There are birds that can actually do that, I doubt it's as powerful as Rose's acid is but its enough to keep predators away**

**Zakura: sometimes...**

**Miss.Ecofreak: stop being so pessimistic. Please review**


	17. Confrontment with Pyro

**Miss.Ecofreak: Hm, funny, I just received an email with the latest review for this fic and the fic says it got 16 reviews but when I press it I find only 15**

**Zakura: that's because PCs are stupid**

**Miss.Ecofreak: right. But the important thing is that I GOT a review and so I must update. (And yes I did get to read it in the email)**

**Before we start I would like to say that I'm sick of the name XD, so I let the dark makers change his name**

**Zakura: and what an imaginative name it is**

**Miss.Ecofreak: well dark makers don't have much fantasy… Enjoy!**

**CHAPTER 17**

**CONFRONTMENT WIT PYRO**

"I don't believe it! How could I have been so stupid?" Buster said and slapped himself on the head several times.

"Is there a problem bro?" Rambo asked.

"Draco-acid! Why didn't I ever think of that? Rose's stomach is full of it so of course that was the missing ingredient!" Buster said hugging Rose. "My girl, you're a genius".

The ottsels and the dragon were still in the living room, Buster had made Balder retell the short story over and over again and before they knew it morning had arrived.

Rambo had already made breakfast.

"Genius? She's just a lizard damn it!" Rambo said before Rose spit a dose of acid right at the fish he was eating.

"The "lizard" just made us the perfect weapon we need to win this war" Balder said. "And don't come tell me it was an accident."

"Oh that's rich. Careful Buster or you little creation might take your job" Rambo said sarcastically. "I still don't believe that this bird-brain can understand ottsel-speak".

"The question weather Rose understands language or not will have to wait, I have to get her to the lab so we can make more Light Eco" Buster said. "Now I kind of wished I made more than one dragon, I doubt the dark makers would just lend us theirs".

"Oh wait a second! What do you mean by that?" Rambo asked.

Buster stopped on his way to the door. Rose, not noticing her creator had stopped, ran straight out and then back in to see where Buster was.

"Well you know, I just thought about what XM said" Buster said.

"What did he say? I was too busy surviving to notice" Rambo said.

"He said the dark makers wanted to take Rose and use her as a mate for their dragon".

"They wanted XD and Rose to mate? That's just disgusting! Buster! As your older brother I refuse you to even think such a thought. Rose might be docile but mix her with that monster and you're going to get your hands full controlling any offspring that may come out".

"I know that, it was just a thought" Buster said, and followed Rose out the door.

Rambo and Balder stayed in the living room, staring at the door.

"You don't think he's gonna do it do you?" Rambo asked.

"What's he supposed to do? Steal XD? In case you haven't noticed he's not just something you can stick in your pocket and walk out with" Balder said.

"I know that, it was just a thought" Rambo said.

"You're hopeless" Balder said shaking his head. "I'll go see what he does".

And with that Balder left for his father's lab.

The lab wasn't nearly as tall as the one in Tunnel Town, but that was only because the cave wasn't big enough. Instead the ottsels had dug a new tunnel far into the mountainside, making the lab almost a cave of its own.

All of Buster's old coworkers who had gotten out of Tunnel Town in the blast, were still working for him, even Jingo's son Spike, who was determined to do whatever it took to defeat his father's empire.

"Hi Balder, Wazzup?" Spike said as he saw the boss' son enter.

"Oh not much, just made a large discovery this morning that's all. Where's dad?" Balder asked.

"In his office with the dragon, I heard about your discovery, well done" Spike said.  
"Well it was actually Rose who did most of the work, I only came with the ingredients" Balder said.

"Sounds like a dream-job, lab-assistant for the dragon" Spike said. "But I gotta go! Leo's probably wondering where his coffee is. See yah".

Balder walked into his father's office and found Rose playing with a ball and Buster was busy adding drops of draco-acid into bottles of eco mix that he had placed behind a thick glass, using a robotic hand to add the acid.

"Done already?" Balder asked.

"Rose has extended her supply of draco-acid" Buster replied. "She threw it all out in two seconds all over my floor".

He pointed at a large black spot on the floor. "Spike will not be glad when I ask him to clean that up, not to mention it will take one week before Rose is ready to deliver another dose".

"But you were able to collect some then?" Balder asked.

"Sure. I scooped some of it of the floor before it evaporated. Not enough to supply an army with light eco weapons but… well" Buster said.

"How much eco have you got?"

"Three bottles" Buster sighed. "This is going to take a loooong time".

Before Rose's fourth birthday, Buster had tried every possible way to make her give more acid to his experiments, including changing her diet every day and tempt her with treats, but she only managed to produce one bottle full of acid every week, and that was only enough to make seven bottles of Light Eco.

"There must be an easier way" Buster sighed for the third time in an equal amount of hours.

Once again Rose had spilt half of her acid all over the newly cleaned floor and was now running around in the lab, which was getting a bit small for her.

This behavior didn't seem to bother Buster; he had long since learned to keep anything breakable out of reach for the dragon but Balder was getting worried.

"Rose is getting more and more restless every day" he said. "Something must be wrong".

"She's just sick of being stuck in the tunnels" Buster said without looking up. "Maybe you should take her out for a walk. I'll come too, I can't do much more in here anyway"  
The two ottsels brought Rose outside and she immediately took wing and started chasing draco-birds around.

After ignoring her for two weeks, Buster now watched his dragon's behavior with much interest.

"They're males" he said.

"Excuse me?" Balder said confused.

"The draco-birds she's chasing. They're all males" Buster said.

"So? Maybe all the females are busy tending for their chicks" Balder said.

"No, not at this time of year. I see some females in the trees around, but Rose is completely ignoring them"

"Why? Does it matter?"

"You wanted an explanation for her strange behavior her last few weeks didn't you? Well now you see it. She's come in heat".

Balder almost got the berry he was eating in his throat. "She's what?"  
"Just looking for a mate. And with no other dragons around she takes is out on the draco-birds. After all they're her closest relatives in these mountains" Buster said as if that was the most obvious thing in the world. "It would be interesting to see what XD would do if he saw her now."

"Oh no it wouldn't. XD hates her and she hates him, they would just fight again" Balder said.

"I'm not so sure. Don't you remember the hamsters Kiko got for Anny? They had one female and one male who couldn't stand each other. But then the female got in heat and suddenly all she wanted was to stay with him and him with her" Buster said.

"You're not planning to test that theory are you?" Balder asked.

"No. That would be too risky. Rose has outgrown XD by five feet already but he's still got more training" Buster said. "But we really have to find somewhere else to keep her; she's too big for the house".

"What about the Party Hall? I'm sure Niko wouldn't mind" Balder said.

"Good idea. I'll go talk to him right away" Buster said and ran into the tunnel.

Balder stayed out a bit longer with Rose, who after a while got fed up chasing the birds and came down to play with him.

They strayed a bit further away from the tunnel to find a large open field where Rose could run around. For a moment nothing seemed to be able to spoil this happy day.

But soon a rumbling sound made the two friends stop.

"What was that?" Balder asked no one in particular.

Rose twittered and placed herself behind Balder and the source of the sound.

It didn't take long before they found it what the rumbling sound was, a gigantic black robot charged its way up the mountainside and stopped right in front of them.

"What do we have here?" a voice from inside the robot said.

A hatch was opened on the machine's head and a familiar face appeared.

"Balder, and you have your little pet with you too. Thank god, I was afraid something had happened to her as I haven't seen any of you for a while, and we wouldn't want that would we?" the dark maker said.

"What do you want Jingo?" Balder snarled.

"To get my payment of course" Jingo said. "Your father stole my idea, and I'm here to take it back".

He looked at Rose with an evil look in his eye, Rose growled back.

"Rose would never go with you no matter what" Balder said.

"Really? I've put up spy-cams around the mountain just so you know, and I saw how she was acting a few hours ago. Do you miss some more friends of your own kind Pinky?" Jingo said.

"Shut up!" Balder said.

"You know, we seem to have run into the same problem. Pyro's getting restless too, last night he broke out of his cage fourteen times"

"Pyro?"

"We decided to change his name after he burned down Ziko's house, with Ziko inside. I think its pointless that we both have one depressed dragon each, when one of us could have two happy ones and then the other wouldn't have to worry about broken buildings and such ever again. Everyone's happy. So what do you say?"

"No!" Balder yelled.

"I was talking to the dragon fuzzball" Jingo said.

Rose didn't answer, nor did she look at the dark maker, she just stared at something behind him.

It was XD, now Pyro; he had a broken chain around his neck and stood frozen staring at the female.

"Hey! Who let you loose? Go back home!" Jingo said.

Pyro ignored him; he just flew closer to Rose.

Rose however, didn't seem keen on meeting him; she growled a warning at him before charging for his neck.

"Well so much for that theory dad" Balder said.

Pyro didn't fight back this time; he just stood still taking all the beating from Rose.

"What's wrong with you bone-head? Get her!" Jingo said.

Pyro hoped out of the way of Rose's second attack, but still he did nothing to hurt her.

He just stared at her, with a sad look in his eyes before he flew away.

"Hey… Tunnel Town is that way…" Jingo said after him as Pyro flew in the opposite direction, and then the dark maker turned towards Balder. "Don't think this is the end ottsel, I'll get you!"

He closed the hatch on his robot and started following after Pyro, probably to try to get him back.

"What just happened there?" Balder asked.

Rose just looked in the direction where Pyro and Jingo had gone.

"He didn't want to fight you did he?" Balder asked her.

Rose shook her head.

"I don't believe it, but maybe that dark dragon can feel love anyway huh?" Balder said.

Rose looked back at him curiously.

"Just a thought" Balder answered her unsaid question. "Should we go find him and ask?"

**Miss.Ecofreak: aw, sweet love**

**Zakura: (throws up)**

**Miss.Ecofreak: oh come on! As if you haven't ever had a boyfriend**

**Fluffy: what about me?**

**Zakura: (ignores the hamster) Neither have you. **

**Miss.Ecofreak: (ignores both animals) Before we quit I have some "bad" news. This is the last finished chapter of The Ancient Ones and so it will probably take more time to update next time, but I have already started the next chapter and will get it up as soon as it is finished (and I get a review). Please review**


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